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Digital Branding

Best TikTok Campaign Creating Methods

Businesses nowadays have a variety of choices for getting the most out of their conversion rate boosting efforts. Social media interfaces are the most common places where these campaigns appear.

You can learn many useful facts about TikTok in the sections below. We’ll show you how to execute successful ads and how to increase your conversion rate on this interface.

Why choose TikTok?

TikTok is a new and possibly most popular social networking platform aimed mostly at entertainment. The user base is quite diverse in terms of age, with people ranging from 14 to 60 years old.

In 2022, the platform is expected to have over 2,1 billion active users, according to research. It’s a shocking amount, especially considering that TikTok was only launched three years ago.

These facts and figures are already convincing. You can almost surely reach your target audience among the 2,1 billion users. 

This option has been available for three years only. Businesses have been using it on a regular basis for two of those years for marketing efforts. That is why employing it for a conversion rate boosting campaign is a relatively new practice.

But is it worth it? We can say that, of course. If you want to raise your conversion rate, TikTok is a great place to start because:

  • You’ll be able to find all of your customer bases in one spot.
  • You can employ audiovisual components to help break down the attention barrier.
  • 50% of users are willing to try something new, that is why your conversion rate can be higher than expected.
  • TikTok users will watch your video content at a higher chance here.

We recommend launching a TikTok campaign if your core audience is mainly under 30 years old. This is key because they are the most active users. That is why they can generate a higher conversion rate. 

Let’s start a campaign

As explained previously, the platform’s main function is to achieve users with uploaded video content. When it comes to developing your advertisements, this is a significant point.

An advertisement should last between 15 and 20 seconds on average. This prevents people from rotating your content. We also recommend that you maintain this length.

You’re probably wondering, “OK”, but what does a successful conversion rate boosting campaign look like? Before you start creating your campaign, keep the following suggestions in mind:

  • Looking for the device
  • Trigger an instant reaction
  • Never forget the music
  • Do preliminary analysis

Let’s look at these points step by step.

Preliminary analysis

Preliminary analytics are the key to your TikTok campaign. You must determine which of your products or services are worth offering. Measurements give you this answer. 

If you forget this step, in the beginning, your chances of increasing your conversion rate will be greatly reduced. You must also decide how you will advertise this product.

Heatmap analysis is a perfect method for this. A heatmap is an analytical tool that shows you how your website is being used by your visitors. Warm colors indicate popular areas of your webshop and cool colors indicate less popular places.

With the help of heatmaps, you can find out which products are popular and which are less.

This will allow you to determine what to advertise. Your product that many people buy or that few. It’s up to you, but we think it’s better to advertise what heatmaps have marked as popular.

The question still remains, how do you advertise, what items do you have to display in your Tiktok campaign?

Heatmaps can help with this, as well.

Examine what are the elements that perform well on your website. What motifs or colors grab your visitors. Be sure to review these during your heatmap analytics, as these will mean the success of your campaign.

The device

After the heatmap analysis, you already know what to advertise and how. However, campaign planning is far from over. Now the specific part is coming.

Despite the fact that it is also available on a desktop computer, the platform is used 99 percent as a mobile application. That is why the main point is to create mobile-friendly content. This is essential for two reasons:

  • To keep your ad from being confusing. Users should not be aware that they watch an ad. If they realize that, this will result in an instant rewinding.
  • Your ad will be blocked by TikTok if it isn’t mobile-friendly. Unfortunately, you will have to start creating material again, which will waste time and money and your conversion rate won’t increase.

It’s critical to think vertically and to strive to structure each object in this manner. To get into the details, here are some criteria that can be a guide for you.

The 9:16 aspect ratio is the greatest method to get the most out of your phone screens, thus we recommend using it. And make your video in MP4 format. If you follow these guidelines your TikTok campaign will be perfect and your conversion rate will increase.

Trigger instant reaction

In the TikTok user community, if anything doesn’t catch their attention, they will quickly go on to the next video. This is a common behavior that you should avoid.

The first few seconds are critical; you must capture your audience’s attention here. This is the only chance to increase your conversion rate.

The best way to do this is to use the audiovisual tools available to you. This is where the data collected by heatmaps comes into play.

The ability to mix the auditory element with visual materials is a big advantage of audiovisual. We recommend using eye-catching colors, images, and text collected by heatmaps, combine with auditive factors.

The colors should match the colors of your webshop, and the overall style should reflect your own. Avoid using too many bright tones, as they have a threatening effect and do not exude quality.

The importance of music

Who wouldn’t be glad to listen to pleasant music? Everyone, of course.

It’s necessary to have some great background music playing in the background of your advertisement at all times. This is significant because music has a relaxing effect. It gives a personality and creates a happy mood.

Users will be more likely to associate a positive feeling with your business or product if they enjoy seeing your ad, and your conversion rate will increase too. Of course, not all songs have the same effect, so we suggest trying to make research among your target audience.

Conclusion

If you want to enhance your conversion rate with the help of social media, TikTok has a lot of potential.

Remember, the whole campaign is based on preliminary analysis. Never miss heatmaps when creating your campaign.

Use the power of audiovisuals and boost your conversion rate with the help of TikTok.

We hope we can help.

Digital Branding

Tips to Shift Your Company Brand

These days, branding is such a huge part of business. Between social media, SEO website building, and blogging to inform and engage customers, keeping a consistent brand can help you find your target demographics. Yet sometimes you need to change your brand message and pivot to avoid a slump and create new demand for your products and services. Whether you’re an established brand or are still finding your brand message, making a shift can refresh your employees and your customers alike. Below are some tips to shift your company brand and gain more success.

Take a Class

Not Creating Clear Brand Guidelines

One thing you should think about doing is taking a class. If you want to learn something new to bolster your business model and shift your business branding, try taking a course. You will find that the more you learn about a particular subject, the more ideas you will have about the branding and direction of your company.

If, for example, you want to reframe your business as an academic endeavor and need to learn more about math, taking online college algebra courses will open up doors to calculate variables into your company and use this mentality in your branding. Whatever it is, taking a class to learn more about an area of expertise you want to brand your business with is only helpful. You won’t regret learning either way.

Relocate

Not Protecting Your Brand’s Image

Another thing to think about when you are rebranding your company is where you are set up. So much of your business’s identity has to do with where you are. The taxes and regulations will also be affected. Whether you’re in an expensive city or want to set up shop in a place that suits your sensibility, relocating is a great way to rebrand. You don’t need to stay in the United States also. Setting up your business in another country isn’t easy, but there are paths and steps to moving your company abroad. If what you need is a complete rebranding that includes moving to another country, it isn’t so far-fetched.

Change Your Look

Whether you want to shift everything about the business or not, changing your look can get the job done. What kind of graphics do you have now? How have you been advertising? What about your website? Could it use a new vibe? Changing the look of your company can facilitate the branding process. You could do it before you change anything or as a big reveal that you are doing something completely new. Wherever you’re at in the process, changing the look and atmosphere of your company will get things going and provide the ability to pivot.

Find a New Name

When you are going through big changes in personnel, investors, or direction, finding a new name for your company is a great way to facilitate a rebrand. This is usually a total shift in branding, but it doesn’t mean that you aren’t doing the same basic work. It just depends on how far you want to go with the rebrand. A new name will differentiate your company from any bad press that has been generated by someone who is no longer a part of your company. Whether you’re avoiding the perils of bad press or simply want to show your new direction, finding a new name for your business is huge.

Cultivate a Vision

Being Too Complicated

Perhaps the most important thing to do in a rebrand is cultivate a new vision. You should also make this vision known. Whatever you are doing next, showing your new vision to the world is incredibly important. If you aren’t clear about what you are doing now, people won’t know what to expect from you. Cultivating a clear vision is imperative to your next move.

Shifting a company brand is never an easy thing to do. Luckily, there are a lot of options to move forward. Whether you’re avoiding heat connected to a person who is no longer with the company or want to show that you are doing something different. Everyone’s goals and ambitions are different, but if you are trying to shift your branding there are plenty of ways to get it done. You got this!

Local Branding

Tips for Sticker Design

Printing stickers for your business or art is a quick and relatively cheap way to get your brand out there. Customers and clients love getting stickers and putting them on laptops, bags, or even cars to show their support. But a sticker needs to be designed well for it to succeed in the marketing world. If you’re looking in the L.A. area for stickers on-demand, you’ll want to have a ready-made sticker to print. Here are a few design tips for your stickers.

Use Different Shapes

Stickers typically come in two shapes, square or circle. And while something a little off-shape, such as a diamond or oval, may work to catch the eye, non-standard forms work better. Attention is drawn to the unusual, so making a sticker with a unique shape will get your sticker seen more.

If you have a mascot, or your art is of a person or animal, design the shape of your sticker around the shape of your subject. The curves and contours of the art will make the sticker stand out and will invite fun placement on different objects. In a sea of 90-degree angles and perfect circles, your unique shape will stand out.

Keep Font Readable

Nothing is worse than having to squint or tilt your head to read something. Stickers are, by nature, small and already a little difficult to see if there’s text. But using a font that is hard to read or doesn’t allow for more than two words without getting all squished together makes for a terrible sticker design.

If you’re using text on your sticker, either as a full quote or just your/your company’s name, make sure you pick a font that is legible and easy to read when small. It’s best to steer clear of any overly decorative or curvy fonts unless you’re only using one word or your text makes up the majority of your sticker design. Using simple and clean fonts helps your sticker stand out and gets your message read.

Maintain Color Coordination

Chances are if you’re making stickers, you’ve already got a brand for you or your company. Which means you have a logo and most likely a website. This means there are colors and designs already associated with your brand. If you’re printing out any marketing material, you want to make sure you keep cohesion with the rest of your brand. Printing out a lime-green sticker may seem like a good idea to attract attention, but if your logo and website are dark blue and silver, you’ll lose the connection, and your sticker won’t be recognizably yours.

Getting your stickers printed on demand is an excellent tool for keeping up with your marketing. But if your sticker isn’t designed well, it can be a futile effort. By utilizing unique shapes, with readable text and colors that match the rest of your brand, you can make quality stickers that represent you and your company.

Social Media Impacts Your Company's Brand
SaaS Branding

WordPress Vs Shopify: Which Should You Choose?

You’ve been looking for a way to sell your products online, but you don’t know where to start.

You’ve heard of WordPress, but you don’t know if it’s for you or what the benefits are. Shopify is another option you’ve considered, but it seems a little more difficult to use and quite costly than WordPress. What should you do?

In this post, we’ll compare both of these options for you, starting with the benefits of each and then continuing to break down how both work, their pros and cons, and whether or not they are the right choice for you.

WordPress

If you ask any WordPress development agency, they will advise you to go with WordPress. For good reason, of course. WordPress is a content management system (CMS) that can be used as a blog, website, e-commerce store, and more. It’s completely free to install, and you can create a user account from WordPress.org in minutes.

WordPress offers many customization options that make it easier for you to add or remove features depending on your business needs or preferences. You can also add plugins that extend the functionality of your website beyond its standard features. There are over 48,000 plugins available for free on their website that you can download to your WordPress site with just a few clicks.

WordPress is also fully compatible with eCommerce websites, so if you want to sell products online, you have the necessary tools at your disposal. These are called WooCommerce extensions, and there are thousands of them available for free. As long as you have a domain and hosting, which we’ll talk about later in this post, you can add an eCommerce website within minutes.

Pros:

WordPress is completely free to use, and they make it very easy for you to add features to your site. In addition, there are 48,000 plugins available for free on their website, from which you can choose. 

Cons:

WordPress doesn’t have a lot of built-in features, and many templates and plugins are outdated, making them impractical to use. In addition, hosting isn’t free, which will cost you money.

Shopify

Shopify is an online store platform that works very similar to WordPress, but it has more features straight out of the box. For example, you don’t need to use any plugins or customize your website for it to work. It’s also pretty much plug and plays; install the software, connect your domain name, and you’re all set to go.

The costs of Shopify are $29/mo for standard plans and $79/mo for the Advanced plan. You can register a domain through them or elsewhere, depending on which hosting option you choose. There is no contract, so you can cancel whenever you want, and they allow you to create 30 products for free without having to pay.

Pros:

Shopify is straightforward to set up and start using, has plenty of great themes & templates, and offers 24/7 support. It’s also much easier than WordPress if you’re not tech-savvy.

Cons:

You have to pay to use Shopify, and the $29/mo plan is pretty expensive for someone who has little to no experience with creating websites.

Who Is This For?

WordPress is the better option two for beginners and experts alike. You can use it very successfully as an eCommerce website without paying $29/mo.

Deciding between these two options depends on how much money you can spare, whether you’re willing to learn WordPress and how comfortable you are with coding. For example, if you had $29/mo to spend, Shopify could be used instead of WordPress because it’s much easier to set up and has excellent support available 24/7.

WordPress is free to use, and their support forums are incredible if you need any help (and you will). Although they don’t offer phone calls or live chat, you can post your questions on the forum and receive detailed answers within hours. They also have very comprehensive documentation available for all of their features, making it easier for you to learn how they work.

If you have no coding or website-building experience, Shopify is the easiest option available to build your eCommerce store. All of their products are plug-and-play, so you don’t need to customize it at all if you don’t want to. The only feature that Shopify doesn’t have is the ability to create your own plugins. However, if you know how to code or are willing to learn, WordPress is much more powerful and allows you to add features that Shopify doesn’t offer.

What Are The Costs?

So now let’s look at what it costs. As we mentioned earlier, starting an online business with eCommerce requires both a domain name and hosting.

Domain Name: A good one will set you back around $10/year. Shopify includes a free .com address with their Standard plan ($29/mo), but if you want to own your domain, it doesn’t cost anything to register one yourself or through GoDaddy, for example.

Hosting: Hostinger is a great tool. According to their website, the cheapest hosting option is $3.92/mo, and it allows up to 10,000 monthly visitors, which is incredible value for the volume of traffic.

WordPress Hosting: If you’re using WordPress, Bluehost offers a great-value hosting plan at $4.95/mo, giving you up to 50,000 monthly visitors and a free domain name (if you register through them).

Shopify Hosting: All Shopify plans come with unlimited bandwidth and storage and allow for unlimited products (which can mean huge numbers). You can choose your plan based on what you think will be best for your business.

The Final Verdict

WordPress is free, flexible, and relatively easy to use once you learn the basics. The themes are beautiful, and there’s a huge community online that’s willing to help if you get stuck or confused at any point. WordPress also gives you the option to customize your site as much as you want and even create custom plugins.

Shopify is easier for beginners and offers a more user-friendly experience, but it can get pricey if you pick their most expensive plan. However, if you’re not an expert at building websites or don’t know how to code, Shopify is by far the simplest option and will save you a lot of time and effort.

WordPress is more powerful, but it takes longer to set up and intimidate people new to coding or online eCommerce. However, if you’re willing to invest the time learning WordPress, we recommend that you choose this over Shopify because of its flexibility and power.

Ultimately, both options will allow you to create a beautiful and successful online business, so choose whichever makes the most sense for your budget and skill level.

Digital Branding

8 Expert Tips to Produce an Account Based Marketing Content Strategy

If you run marketing campaigns for a B2B company, chances are you have heard of Account Based Marketing.

Also called ABM, it is a marketing strategy meant to reach potential prospects within a target company. Instead of reaching out to an individual, ABM allows you to connect to a group of stakeholders.

This also explains why ABM requires close coordination between marketing and sales to succeed. Add to that content marketing, and you can produce excellent results.

But to make that happen, you need to produce precise content. This can be based on industry, roles and functions of your target decision-makers, or the size of an organization.

That said, here are eight tips that you can use to develop an Account Based Marketing content strategy:

Know Your Target’s “Who” and “What”

Sure, Account Based Marketing means that you are reaching out to a target account. However, every account is made up of a group of decision-maskers.

Before you build a content marketing campaign for a prospect, you need to know who you should target. You also need to identify their roles in an organization.

That’s because a piece of information that matters for a Chief Finance Officer may not matter for a Chief Executive Officer.

However, you should not rely on LinkedIn alone when scouring the Internet to target accounts. You should also look into a company’s annual reports, earning calls, social media accounts, and blog. Doing so can give you an insight into the key issues that a prospect is facing and how your products and services can help solve those.

Use an Account-specific Subdomain

This one is pretty basic but often overlooked.

Whenever you are driving a lead to your website, it would help to use a specific subdomain. Doing so adds a personalized touch. It also makes your prospect feel that you went the extra mile to create an online experience that is unique to them.

As such, it will be inherent for them to engage and interact. That’s called the “power of reciprocity.”

Build a Content-rich Microsite

In relation to the previous point, your account-specific subdomain must have the right pieces of content. This is where having a microsite can come in handy.

Think of your microsite as a content hub. This is where you will organize and present relevant content, third-party data, and resources that will be meaningful to your prospect.

That said, we recommend that you use an ABM platform that can help you build and measure your microsite’s ROI. This includes the number of site visitors, the most accessed content, and how they interact with your data.

Incorporate the Company Name

There is a reason personalization is integral in content marketing. One of which is that it compels your prospect to act.

But do not take our word for it. Let the numbers speak for themselves:

  • 74% of consumers are frustrated when web content is not personalized.
  • 80% of consumers are more likely to purchase from a brand that provides a personalized experience.
  • Consumers view personalized content as essential.
  • 85% of consumers are influenced to buy because of personalized homepage promotions.
  • Personalized calls to action convert two times better than a standard CTA.

A straightforward way to personalize your B2B offer is to incorporate your prospect’s company name. Instead of saying “Learn How to Improve Company Efficiency,” you can say “Improve Efficiency at Oracle.”

Provide the Right Tools to Your Sales Team

As mentioned earlier, Account Based Marketing requires coordination between marketing and sales. As such, you must be providing your sales team with the right tools.

That’s because they will be the ones who will make the connection with your prospects.

Arm your sales team with guided conversations, including value-driven offers like a product demo. That way, they can get the prospects to respond to them and move them further down the sales funnel.

From there, your sales team can gather critical data about your target account. For instance, they can ask whether a prospect uses a competitor’s products and services and what additional features they would like to have.

Pitch a Web-based Presentation

A personalized, content-rich microsite is fantastic, but they are not meant to drive sales. Sure, they allow a prospect to navigate through your content and learn about what you can do for their business. However, it does not demonstrate how your products and services work.

This is where a web-based presentation comes in.

It is like a “virtual salesperson” that pitches your products and services in a linear, storytelling way. Doing so enables you to control your marketing message and pacing. For instance, you can include how your products and services work and how your prospect can make the most out of it.

Offer a Useful Client Experience

Here’s the thing: Prospect-to-salesperson connections do not always happen. That’s because there are target accounts that would like to gather more information before you can urge them to talk to you.

As such, it would be helpful if you could provide your ideal clients with the right tools and content that can support their exploration. This includes interactive white papers, assessments, and quizzes. Doing so can also enable you to accelerate a target account’s consideration phase.

Track and Measure Your Content

Just like with any content marketing campaign, you should always track and measure your efforts.

For instance, you can measure the engagement levels of each persona. That way, you would know which content fosters prospect-to-salesperson connection and generates sales.

On the other hand, you can tweak or eliminate content that does not produce results.

Still, keep in mind that your analytics will only work if you have well-defined goals and KPIs. So ensure that you have them in place before you run an ABM content strategy.

ABM and Content can Work Hand-in-Hand

The content tips listed above are some of the things you can do when building a content marketing strategy for your ABM effort. Regardless, the key here is to produce highly-targeted content.

Build a microsite or a web-based product demonstration that will be relevant to your target account. That way, your prospects will be compelled to interact with you. It will also enable you to guide them further down the sales funnel.

As a result, you can generate excellent ROI.

Legal Branding

6 Ways to Maintain Your Customer Base

Customers are the lifeblood of every business; thus, it is critical to continue generating leads and maintaining existing customers. However, doing so is frequently a source of anxiety for firms, with more than one-third citing new business generation as their top concern.

The economy is constantly changing, and it is critical to preserve your consumer base even when times are tough. As competition increases, retaining your customer base is becoming more challenging and exponentially important.

What is Customer Loyalty?

Customer loyalty is defined as a customer’s dedication to your brand. A devoted consumer will always choose you above the competition, whether it’s due to your exceptional customer service, unrivaled product variety, or another method to distinguish yourself. Business owners must develop ways to maintain their consumer base without competing only on pricing. There are a few key ways to maintain your customer base.

1. Utilize Various Lines of Communication

Frequent contact with your customers keeps you in their minds and allows you to pass on crucial information. It is important to know which platforms and methods of communication are best for them. Whatever communication channels your company uses, it’s critical to ensure that what you’re doing is beneficial for your customers. Their capacity to speak effectively with you will aid in maintaining their trust and loyalty.

Someone should be available to answer as soon as a consumer sends you a message via Facebook, email, Instagram, or your online chatbot. Streamlining communication may mean tapping into the benefits of outsourced call centers such that professional support representatives provide customers with round-the-clock support. Moreover, you should have scripts prepared and a method in place to manage any form of engagement, whether it’s a simple question or a complex problem, to help streamline communication.

2. Strong Customer Service

To cultivate a loyal client base, you must provide a memorable customer experience at each stage. This journey typically starts with your website, which should be user-friendly and mobile-friendly, and progresses to direct client interactions and after-sales support.

Specifically, your client service should be excellent. Clients want prompt, knowledgeable responses, problem resolution, and cautious direction. Your marketing approach also plays a role in providing excellent customer experiences.

Remember to pay special attention to the quality of your product. Offering a high-quality product is the most powerful weapon for a growing company competing against established corporations. It will be difficult to recover if negative reviews begin to circulate. In this case, quality can either save or sink your brand.

3. Social Media Presence

Customers and organizations can now exchange information and engage in conversations thanks to social media. There are excellent ways for businesses to reach out via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and other networks. This communication can range from online customer service to leveraging social media to gain insights into your audience. Your industry, target audience, and preferred mode of communication will determine which ones perform best for you.

Millennials and Generation Z spend more time online than prior generations, making them more susceptible to social media influence. In general, social media can be a valuable tool for staying on top of current trends, obtaining insight into what your consumers truly believe, and ensuring long-term client loyalty.

4. Special Promotions and Offers

Using cutting-edge analytics technology, businesses may offer customers discounts on things they buy regularly, as well as products that complement previous purchases. Offering a special discount, whether for college students, veterans, or senior people, is a terrific way to recognize (and retain) certain parts of your client base.

Discounts can help persuade customers to buy from you during traditionally quiet periods. For example, a movie theater that offers $5 Monday tickets or a restaurant that offers a 10 percent discount to students on weeknights. Knowing that they can obtain a better bargain on a specific day or during holiday seasons can assist you in building a loyal consumer base.

5. Loyalty Programs

What better method to keep a loyal customer base than to express your appreciation? Clients appreciate businesses that go out of their way to thank them by giving something back.

Consider rewarding your customers with extra incentives like discounts, additional services, and exclusive products.

This can be accomplished through the use of a point-based loyalty program. A heads-up about impending releases and changes, along with an “early bird deal,” may also suffice. People appreciate an exclusive offering or a sneak peek since it makes them feel like they’re a part of the gang. Another possibility is to provide special deals or even a sales commission to consumers that drive new business.

6. Brand Collaborations

By partnering with other companies that provide comparable services, you can not only reach a new audience but also potentially offer more to your current clients. This approach is excellent for increasing your exposure and providing more options to your existing clients.

For example, if you run a veterinarian clinic, you may collaborate with a local pet food store. This will bring your company’s name to the attention of the pet food store’s customers and vice versa. Collaborations can also apply to your company’s charitable efforts. By informing your consumers that a portion of their purchase will be donated to a specific charity, you demonstrate your dedication to your community while also increasing the organization’s exposure.

 

The Value of Customers

The value of your customers is a crucial factor in the value of your company. Analyzing customer profitability and maximizing a customer’s lifetime value is critical to every firm. To expand your customer base, you must maintain continual contact with both new and existing customers.

The more value your company can provide, the more likely it will remain loyal. Maintaining a deep understanding of your customers’ challenges and worries, as well as taking steps to build your relationships, can mean the difference between falling behind and thriving.

Merging Pdfs
Legal Branding

6 mistakes to avoid in the early stages of a startup

Most startups fail in the first year. This is simply because this is the most crucial time in a startup’s journey: Moving from the idea stage to the market. To help your startup succeed, here are the six mistakes to avoid in the early stages of a startup.

 

Developing a technical prototype too soon

Technical prototypes cost money and time. It is something that you will need to do at some point. But you shouldn’t jump the gun and develop one too soon. You need to be really solid on your idea first. Instead, ensure that the financial and marketing sides of your business are in place. Then, start to look at prototyping.

 

Not having a knowledgeable mentor

Getting advice is crucial to the success of your startup, especially in those early stages. Yet so many entrepreneurs avoid doing this. Mentors offer valuable insights into the field that you are entering and can help to guide you through all the challenges that it presents. If you don’t know anyone who can offer you some guidance, then look online. There are so many startup communities that have forums and groups where your questions can be answered.

 

Lacking a well-defined business plan

In those early stages, you really need to know what the future holds for your new company. That means having a detailed business plan created that will cover all aspects of your business. It may initially seem like a boring task, but many entrepreneurs fail because they don’t do this. Hence, you should put the time and effort into making sure that you have one!

 

Outsourcing unnecessarily

While you need to get going, getting everything done for you is rarely the best idea. For example, outsourcing your accounting or bookkeeping can seem like a good idea at first. But in reality, it’s usually not. You really need to know what is happening with your finances if your business is to succeed! So, do as much work as you can. Another example is app-building and website building. With today’s no code technology, you can build most of these things yourself. Here’s a useful guide on everything no-code.

 

Picking the wrong investors

Another thing that most new entrepreneurs get wrong is who they choose as an investor. That’s because, if it isn’t done right, you could be on the end of some seriously bad advice. When you first begin looking for investors, do so by asking around. See if you know anyone who has money to invest. If not, then start researching online. Look at the Angel Investment Network and see if they can find you a potential investor.

Expanding the team too soon

When it comes to expanding your team, you need to be careful. As the old saying goes: “Too many cooks spoil the broth.” You really need to consider carefully who you bring on board as an employee or a contractor. This is because if that person isn’t 100% dedicated and committed to your company, then he or she could end up causing some serious issues.

Legal Branding

7 Awesome Automation Tools to Supercharge Your Content Creation Process

Content creation is a key function in digital marketing that demands both time and effort. The content you put out there speaks volumes about your business and your authority in your field. This is why optimizing the content creation process should be one of your top priorities. The more tools and aides your content creators have at their disposal, the more productive they are likely to be.

According to a survey by HubSpot, 68% of businesses use automation in some way. Another report by MarketingProfs says that 92% of marketing agencies are now investing more time and resources into marketing automation. use of automation tools and software has resulted in increased ROI for many marketers who have automated some of their content marketing activities.

If you are looking for the best automation tools that can give you a competitive advantage, here are 7 awesome tools you should know about.

1. Narrato – Content creation and collaboration platform

Narrato is a content creation and workflow management platform that helps you see through your content creation process from start to finish. It’s a great collaboration platform where your entire content team and stakeholders can come together to build great content.

Narrato Workspace can help you:

Collaborate with your content team – You can add your entire content team to the Workspace on Narrato, including your writers, editors, content managers, clients, partners, and other stakeholders. You can assign your team members to tasks and get them to collaborate on any piece of content. You can also share content with partners and stakeholders using public content links.

Manage a team of writers – Narrato is a perfect platform to manage your team of writers – be it your in-house staff or freelance / part-time writers. Content task assignment is super convenient (you can assign multiple tasks to a writer in one go). You can even track work done and payments due for your contract or freelance writers.

Create quality content – Narrato boasts of a powerful content editor, which allows you to optimize your content for readability and gives great content structuring suggestions. You can even run a plagiarism check on content using the editor. What’s even cooler is the ability to create custom content templates to get structured input from your writers.

Organize your content and projects – Narrato offers you a great platform to organize all your content projects in a single place. It’s structured very much like your local or cloud drive with folders and content items. But offers you several other views of your content to facilitate easy access and planning. For instance – a view of all content items without folders and a content calendar view, which is great for planning and tracking content work.

Track content and project progress – All content tasks run through workflow statuses and you can also track the overall progress of your project using project status bars.

Publish and deliver content seamlessly – Narrato Workspace integrates with WordPress and supports HTML publishing as well.

Create a guidelines and brand assets repository – This is a cool feature which allows you to create a guidelines document with attachments, and you can link it repeatedly to multiple tasks anytime.

Pricing: Free at the moment. May launch paid plans soon.

2. Automizy – Email marketing and automation software

Automizy is an email marketing automation tool that helps you distribute your content and engage with leads at the right time. Email marketing is one of the most important areas of any digital marketing strategy. But handling emails manually can be quite tedious. You have hundreds of prospective leads, each at a different stage in their journey towards conversion.

Email automation allows you to send them targeted, personalized emails at the right moment to increase your chances of conversion. With Automizy, you can build your contact list with the help of sign-up forms you create. The platform has an email automation builder that helps you define the entire process of sending an automated email, based on the actions taken by the prospect.

The drag and drop email editor also lest you create high-performing emails without any additional skill requirements. The AI tool on the platform helps by predicting the performance of your subject lines.

Pricing: Paid plans start at $9 per month for 200 contacts.

3. TubeBuddy – Productivity and SEO tool for YouTube

Nearly 61% of digital marketers say they have achieved better ROI with video marketing than with Google Ads. So you can imagine how important it is that your video content performs well, particularly on platforms like YouTube.

TubeBuddy is a browser extension that helps you get more views and subscribers on YouTube faster. The tool helps you with advanced keyword research, simplifying publishing, optimizing content to rank higher in search results, promoting your videos on social media, and data analysis to identify improvement opportunities.

Pricing: They are offering a free plan with limited features. The paid plans start at $7.20 per month.

4. Typito – Video maker to create videos with text

Another amazing video content platform, with a slightly different use case, is Typito. Typito is a video creation app with an easy drag-and-drop editor. You can customize your videos with your brand colors and fonts. You can also add captions easily that are perfectly synced with the video.

The platform offers more than 20 video formats, over 600,000 free images, and 500+ motion graphic templates.

Pricing: The paid plan starts at $29 per month.

5. Jasper – AI-based copywriting software

Jasper is an AI-powered copywriting software that can create high converting copy for ads, emails, websites, blogs, and more. This could be a very useful tool to create a compelling copy during web design and development work, without having to hire a copywriter just yet. It can also be an invaluable tool for your sales, marketing, and customer support teams, saving them a lot of time on content creation.

Jasper can generate several high-converting headlines with just a little input about the product or service for which you need a copy. You can also set the tone for your copy to go with your brand image. The tool lets you translate your content to more than 25 different languages too.

Pricing: The starter plan is priced at $29 per month.

6. CreatorKit – Video tool for content creators

CreatorKit is a video creation tool for creating social marketing videos. The platform lets you create animated videos, stories, and ads for different social platforms with its easy-to-use video editor. It has thousands of templates to fit various social channels.

You can customize videos to reflect your brand and save your customized templates to use again. You can also add price tags, discounts, and other engaging text to your marketing videos.

Pricing: Pricing information not available

7. Zencastr – Podcast recording tool

According to a research report, the number of podcast listeners in the US alone has grown by 29.5% in the last 3 years. Podcasts are a high-potential marketing tool today, competing with video and written content.

Zencastr is a tool that helps you record studio-quality podcasts from anywhere. It allows you to record a lossless 16-bit 48k WAV audio track with each guest, without any time limits. Since it is local recording, the internet connection speed does not matter and you can get high-quality audio every time.

The tool has built-in VoIP that lets you chat, talk, leave live footnotes, and record at the same time. It also has a Soundboard for live editing of your podcasts and an automatic post-production tool to help you achieve the final product.

Pricing: Free plan with limited features for hobbyists. The professional plan costs $20 per month.

Conclusion

Each of these marketing and automation tools is sure to drive more engagement for your business. Content creating and marketing requires skill and effort. But it also demands the right tools and technology to deliver the best results. Try out these amazing automation tools and watch your content performance soar higher than ever before.

Author bio:

Neelam Goswami is a Content Writer at Godot Media, a leading content writing services agency. Her areas of interest include digital and content marketing. She is also an amateur artist and loves to spend time on creative work.

Digital Branding

Smart ways for start-ups to get rid of mistakes

One needs to identify what hinders him and his organization from succeeding and think of smart ways that can avoid such mistakes. In this post, we will study a few of the smart ways that can help startups from making mistakes. 

The mistakes in business are inevitable but a few of the mistakes can lead to a downfall for the company. Sometimes it only takes one wrong move to destroy the hard work of years. Due to pandemics, many companies have filed for bankruptcy and hence it has become crucial to stay prepared. One cannot afford mistakes in the business. This time we will look into the smart ways that can avoid the mistakes. 

The smart ways here stands for measurable, specific, relevant, and achievable and time-based ways that can be accepted by any organization. It is the outline to achieve the business goals and ways to reach them. Learning from the mistakes is one of the best terms and generating smart ways to avoid such mistakes is the best idea. 

Stick to the plan 

A lot of business people or startups tend to skip the major work of creating a plan for the business as they feel that they can go with the flow. The business plan indeed needs to have the flexibility to be changed with the growth and direction of the business unit but still, it is important to have a major plan ready from the beginning. The business plan includes the business goals and ways to achieve them. It works as the blueprint of the business for the employees and partners. 

Even though the plan is flexible and keeps on changing with the circumstances and activities of a business, it is suggested to stick to the major aim and working plan to get successful. If the original plan keeps on changing again and again it becomes difficult for the employees and partners to understand it well. Lack of understanding plan can result in irrelevant work. 

Setting better goals 

While running a small startup or a basic structure, one needs to articulate the goals. One of the common mistakes made by entrepreneurs is not setting clear, specific and feasible goals. One can never settle with an idea of “making a profit” as a goal for the business unit. One needs to focus on the required activities and decide the goals accordingly to get successful. Failing to set goals and going without them can result in the downfall of the whole unit. 

Asking for support 

It becomes easy to reach the top and achieve the desired goals when you have people to support you. Many startup owners tend to believe that they are enough to succeed in the business, but it is not so. Every owner requires employees and a team effort to achieve success. Running a business unit is a complicated process and can result in getting overwhelmed. Hence, one must never hesitate to ask for support, assistance and mentorship. It is suggested to surround yourself with experts to learn business strategies. 

Use of the latest technology 

With the development in technology, the way of working in businesses have drastically changed. To adapt to the changes, you need to reach customers online. Traditional businesses fail as they cannot adapt to the digital era. 

One needs to stay updated with the time and technology and take the advantage of the new tools out in the market. One must opt for creating a new website, modernizing the daily operations, building an online presence and much more as the benefits of technology. 

Staying updated with market 

Regardless of the products, it is more important for the businesses to have people knowing them and their products. To stay competitive in the industry, one need to edge over the other existing brands. The digital marketing help to broadcast the business assets to lure customers. Contrary to the belief, marketing is not at all expensive. One can simply use social media and its likes to promote the business. It is about being creative and putting efforts to make people talk about your business and its products only by using social media accounts.

Conclusion 

There are a lot of factors that contribute to the success or failure of the business unit. The failure is majorly a result of combined wrong decisions and lack of planning. Whereas success can be a result of appropriate planning and measures to achieve the decided plan. 

To prevent the business from getting failed, one must control how to react to the internal and external problems faced in future. Many startups fail as they are now aware of how to respond to such a crisis. We shared a few of the smart ways especially for the startups to get rid of the mistakes that lead them towards failure. 

Author’s Bio

Jui Bhatia is a Software Analyst at Techimply, India. With the experience in technology-driven field, she has mastered her knowledge on How(s) and What(s) to be done for a business. Also, she’s keen to share her knowledge on a few technology-related topics with readers that can assist any kind of business.

Digital Branding

Multi-vendor store: What it is and the reason to build it right away?

No single-vendor or eCommerce store can’t compete with a Multi-vendor store as it provides extensive benefits to both the sellers and owners. These multi-vendor marketplaces have been the thing that changes the whole way the eCommerce sector operates. 

Multi-vendor stores gained popularity in a short span of time, with much visibility and sales growth. This becomes advantageous if business seekers or existing business owners develop a multi-vendor marketplace platform like Amazon, eBay, Alibaba, Etsy, etc., or can create a multi-vendor marketplace website to sell niche products or services under broad store categories such as electronics, groceries, furniture, home needs, etc.

As more and more online merchants or vendors want to scale their businesses, they look for marketplace platforms to sell their products and services. So one thing is proven here, the business opportunities and possibilities with multi-vendor marketplace software are nearly endless.

Hence, building an online multi-vendor store would definitely be a wise choice if you’re looking to scale and expand your eCommerce business. 

Why create a multi-vendor store?

As we mentioned previously, the opportunities with the multi-vendor stores are endless, similar reasons to develop a multi-vendor marketplace store. These stores ease the way of onboarding vendors into the platform with a few step procedures. You might think having multiple vendors might stress you in vendor management, but the thing is entirely different here. Such multi-sellers in your multi-vendor platform actually improve the website traffic and importantly reduce vendor and store management time. 

Being an admin of the multi-vendor store, you don’t need to keep a huge inventory that stresses you out and collapses your steady business process. Most importantly, it opens a new source of income by charging vendors a fee for every successful transaction made on a multi-vendor store platform without any overhead hassle. 

Components of multi-vendor store platform

Like huge machinery, the multi-vendor store has a wide range of components and ways to handle it. If you compare a real machine with the multi-vendor platform, each component represents a part of the machine. In order to work well, each part has to work at the right pace, even if one part misses out in the place where it has to be, there isn’t a proper outcome. 

For instance, if inventory is your top priority, and you’re giving much attention towards it but not on every other component like shipping, then your store won’t have the sales that expect to drive out from it. 

Hence, it is important to know and manage all the components of a multi-vendor store to keep balance in managing the whole store. 

Take a moment to overview the various components of the multi-vendor platform,

  • Managing Inventory
  • Charging Seller Fees
  • Managing Orders
  • Shipping Orders
  • Paying Vendors
  • Sales Reports
  • Branding the Marketplace

Top compelling reasons to go with Multi-vendor store

Pull and convert your first-time buyers into regular buyers

Every website, importantly the eCommerce, looks good if it is designed well, and that is what every customer seeks from a multi-vendor store. Such design aspects of the store will be more useful to attract the audience into the store and there would be a possibility to turn them into regular buyers. Because the storefront of the multi-vendor store is the brand face of the business that seeks engaging customers.

Multiple brands under a single roof

A multi-vendor store is primarily known as the house of multiple brands under a single storefront. Ultimately, it is very easy to manage those brand products efficiently with each sub-store. The multi-vendor store comes with the best setup functions that enable companies to operate with multiple brands, create an individual store for each brand and sell, earn revenue while carrying out every activity such as listing, selling, managing under one roof. Such companies with multiple brands can make a good profit by leveraging the multi-vendor store approach. 

Huge gain with absolute customizations

Setting up a multi-vendor eCommerce means getting ahead with ultimate customization. So the prime motive to have a multi-store is to create a separate store for each user for better convenience and business management. Such an advantage comes to hand if the whole setup is fully customizable, which ensures maximum ROI. Multi-vendor marketplace solutions are flexible enough to suit and fit into your business needs and functionalities. Hence, such flexibility in the platform enables you to customize the store’s products, prices, information, themes, shipping, checkouts, and more. 

Boost in sales with mobile commerce

Several studies conclude that above 81% of the eCommerce sales are coming from mobile devices. Mobile devices have become an integral part of online shopping, with over 85% of online orders overtaking the desktops, tablets, and other devices cumulatively. Some even consider targeting mobile phone users to boost eCommerce sales as part of their eCommerce marketing strategies. Along with the eCommerce mobile app, advanced features like push notifications, in-app purchase ads, personalized recommendations pushes mobile commerce to stand out from other forms of online purchase.

Much of the marketing and promotional options 

Apart from generic marketing and promotional tools, the multi-vendor store comes with eCommerce marketing features for effective target marketing based on the likes, dislikes, browsing history, and other purchase activities. If you own multiple stores, so you need different marketing strategies for each store, it is where the multi-vendor store solution comes into play to match your eCommerce business strategies and options such as SMS, mobile push notification, email, chatbots to bring out maximum ROI. 

Wrapping up

Managing a multi-vendor store is a lot easier than setting up, managing, and selling with a single vendor. This is why a multi-vendor marketplace is the best option to choose if you want to enter the eCommerce business to explore amazing business opportunities.

 


Tags: Multi-vendor, multi-vendor marketplace, ecommerce marketplace, multi-vendor platform