5 Steps to Creating Effective Customer Surveys In the wake of Google's Penguin update, the quality of your online content should be one of your top priorities. Not only can packing your pages full of high-value posts improve your presence in the natural search results, it also can go a long way toward improving customers' experience on your website. One way you can determine which types of content you should focus on is through customer surveys. Follow these five steps to conduct effective surveys that turn up the most insightful results: 1. To decide on your topics, first go to your Google Analytics account and look at your Top 10 content pages. Related: How to Create a Search-Friendly Website 2. As you're writing your survey questions, try to let participants expand on their thoughts. 3. If you do decide to offer an incentive, think through how you'll distribute it to readers. 4. Both of these tools enable you to set up simple customer feedback forms for free. Related: 5 Tips for Making Your Website More Social 5.
ClickBrain - Marketing is Dead. Long live the relationship! 5 Ways to Take Customer Loyalty to the Next Level New customers are the lifeblood of companies. Or are they? Lately, marketers have been spending more time on current customers -- revamping what customer service means, investing more in customer relationship management (CRM) systems and building teams to improve communication with customers. In this age of social connectivity, customer loyalty has become more valuable than ever. Since customer loyalty can be critical to making a sale, ask yourself what you're doing to cultivate it. Here are five ways you can take customer loyalty up a notch: 1. Rather than merely using that page to confirm an action, why not add some useful resources, follow-up steps or company contact information? Related: Richard Branson on the Secret to Exceeding Customer Expectations 2. When you take the time to improve your feedback channels, you are telling your audience, "We care about what you think." 3. Related: How to Get Customers Using Your Online Rewards (Video) 4. 5.
A VC: Marketing You asked for it Arnold and 84 others (so far). So I'm gonna talk about marketing. I believe that marketing is what you do when your product or service sucks or when you make so much profit on every marginal customer that it would be crazy to not spend a bit of that profit acquiring more of them (coke, zynga, bud, viagra). A very experienced and successful entrepreneur came into our office a week ago to pitch his latest company. At the end of his pitch he showed us some numbers. Normally for a raw startup we see almost all product and engineering expenses (headcount). So a few days later, I called him. Zynga has spent millions on customer acquisition and continues to do so. In my talk at Harvard Business School, I said "Early in a startup, product decisions should be hunch driven. Early in a startup you need to acquire your customers for free. So if you need to acquire customers for free early in a startup, how do you do that? 2) Social hoooks – Your product/service must be social.
What You Need to Know About Pricing In Impact Pricing: Your Blueprint for Driving Profits from Entrepreneur Press, pricing expert Mark Stiving offers practical advice to business owners on how to price products and services. In this edited excerpt, he explains several important pricing concepts. Price may not be the basis of your corporate strategy, but you must have a pricing strategy to implement your corporate strategy. Remember that pricing strategies are big-picture decisions that provide guidance to the people within your organization who actually set prices. They are your pricing processes and policies. When you ask a marketer "What are some pricing strategies?" Neutral Pricing Neutral pricing, the most common pricing strategy, means that you price so that your customers are relatively indifferent between your product and your competitor's product after all features and benefits, including price, are taken into account. Penetration Pricing Penetration pricing means pricing more aggressively than neutral.
The 14 Most Powerful and Effective Words in Marketing | 60 Second Marketer | Tips, Tools and Techniques for Marketers Around the Globe In Go Mobile, the book I’ve written with Jeanne Hopkins from HubSpot, we review a list of the 14 most powerful words in marketing so that readers can use them in their mobile marketing campaigns. This post gives you a sneak peak at the list that’s included in the book. Enjoy. Have you ever bought a product that you didn’t really need? Or, you may have been told about a deadline to buy concert tickets, join a health club or even buy a car for 0% interest. What’s up with that? This week, I’ll be posting blogs on this very topic. Below, you’ll find the 14 most powerful and effective words in marketing. I’ll cover this entire topic in depth when I speak at the SXSW conference. FreeNowYouSaveMoneyEasyGuaranteeHealthResultsNewLoveDiscoveryProvenSafety After decades of testing, these words have proven to be the ones that are the most persuasive at encouraging people to choose Brand A over Brand B. What do all these words have in common? How should you use these words in your marketing campaigns?
Five Low-Cost Local Marketing Ideas Over the years I've found that most entrepreneurs spend too much time and money on promotions that don’t generate new business. Whether it is local sports sponsorships, newspaper-ad buys or social media, they waste money on marketing strategies that may boost their egos by making them local celebrities, but don’t actually translate into sales. Related: How to Stand Out by Keeping it Simple Entrepreneurs, especially those relying on customers in their local areas, should first focus on networking with other area businesses, major employers, schools, churches and other organizations. They should network and then create marketing strategies and events that are beneficial to all parties. Here are some marketing ideas to consider before breaking out the big bucks: 1. 2. Related: How Partnerships Can Help Extend Your Small Marketing Budget 3. 4. 5. These strategies don’t take up much time.
Consumer Behavior: The Psychology of Marketing StartupNation - Source for Small Business Advice, Help Starting a Business, Entrepreneur Forum Dr. José Antonio París: Marketing para Latinoamérica. 3 Simple Tricks for Getting New Customers Smart marketers know that as much as 80% of their revenues come from repeat customers. Once you transform someone from prospect to customer and then give them a great experience, your next sale to that customer will be much easier. In fact, oftentimes the next sale will be initiated by the customer without any effort on your part. So the best way to get more sales from repeat customers is...make more sales to first-time customers! For instance, if your initial sale to a customer is $40, but the average customer will purchase four more times within the first year, then a new customer is actually worth $200 in the first year. To help you do this, below are three tips for attracting first-time customers. First-Time Customer Strategy #1: Give Them a Deal Some companies go as far as to lose money on their first sale (known as a loss-leader), knowing they'll make it back with an immediate upsell, monthly service, or future sales. So use these special offers carefully.
Ocean Marketing: How to self-destruct your company with just a few measly emails [update] Update: A representative for the Avenger Controller (a new one, obviously) has released an official statement regarding Ocean Marketing’s involvement with their product and the actions of Paul Christoforo. Original story: Strap yourself in, you’re about to witness the most outlandlish PR blunder in video gaming history. And trust me, there have been many… From VentureBeat Customers don’t just get irritated when you screw up cross-channel personalization. Starting earlier this morning with a post on Penny Arcade, co-founder Mike “Gabe” Krahulik brought to light a series of emails between Dave, a customer politely inquiring about the status of his Avenger PlayStation 3 controller order, and Paul Christoforo of Ocean Marketing, the PR lead for the product. I’m going to repost the emails in their entirety, then we’ll continue much, much further down the rabbit hole afterward. From: Ocean Marketing To: Dave Dec 16, 2011 2:45 PMDec 17– Paul Christoforo
75 Startup Tools And Apps new business ideas and startups So you have a new business or startup idea and based on your analysis and research you have conducted, your confident that there is a market for it. Ok, now what? You need to possibly find a cofounder and team to start planning, seek funding and successfully execute the plan for a pilot or full launch. There are so many resources and tools out there that can assist you in managing and excuting your startup or new business idea more eficiently and effectively. As a result, I have produced a list of my favourite tools and applications covering the various disciplines you will need to undertake in order to successfully execute and launch your startup or new business. Here are just a few tools and applications that I have used over the years in managing and delivering small to large projects. Brainstorming Ideas | Bubbl.us Simple online application that helps you create colorful mind maps that you can print and share with others and it's FREE. MindManager Creately Springpad Evernote Branding | Notebox