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Welcome to the iASP Central series How to Create a Social Media Marketing Strategy.

If you've been following the series, we have now reached Part Five of our Six step journey to developing a Social Media Marketing (SMM) Strategy. 

In case you've missed the previous articles, you can catch up here: 

Part One - How to Perform a Social Media Audit

Part Two - How to Set Goals and Objectives

Part Three - How to Identify Key Target Audiences

Part Four - How to Plan Social Media Marketing Tactics

Next we focus on how to successfully execute a SMM strategy. 

Let's dive in… 

Part Five -  How to Execute a SMM Strategy 

Once a SMM strategy has been researched, planned and developed.. it's time to put the plan into action!

Execution is the process of delivering a SMM strategy and bringing it to life. 

Have you ever heard of the phrase 'Execution is Everything?'

Well, the execution phase of a SMM strategy is considered very important. 

The delivery process can be critical to the overall success of the campaign. 

Even the most highly crafted, well thought out strategies can fail, if a plan is not executed effectively. 

The execution phase of a SMM strategy can be a challenging process. It can require a significant amount of organisation, project management, leadership skills and team communication. 

When there are multiple marketing activities coordinated at the same time, there can also be more room for error.

If possible, formulating a team to take on various roles and responsibilities can help with the delivery process.

So how can you help ensure a smooth-sailing and well executed strategy?

Follow iASP Central's 3 step process: 

Step 1. Update Social Media Accounts 

The first step is to update all social media accounts. 

All business information and branding should be current and consistent across all social media platforms. 

It's important that social media branding reflects business values, goals and marketing messages. 

Ensure all images and written content is engaging and appeals to your primary target audiences. 

iASP Central Example: If your Facebook Business page features a high-quality business logo for the profile image, make sure this is visually consistent across Instagram, Google+ and LinkedIn. Or if your business has a marketing tag-line, be sure to include it in the description on all social profiles. 

Part 1 - How to Perform a Social Media Audit, provides steps on how to analyse key competitors social media accounts including their strengths, weaknesses and potential opportunities.  

A social media audit can help identify outdated information, improve visual branding and establish potential branding opportunities. Identifying branding opportunities can help set you aside from competitors social media.

When updating social media profiles, consider the following: 

• Logos, Profile and Cover Images - Use high quality, professional, visually appealing images or video
• Page Content - Update Profile Descriptions or 'About Us' sections to include current contact details, keywords, links and tag-lines that reflect strategy goals
• Call-to-action - Include a CTA that strategically encourages customers to act. This could be 'Call Now' 'Message Now' or 'Visit Website'. A CTA can help with conversion rate and achieve sales goals. 
• Update Profile Settings - Ensure your profile is fully optimised, that your Profile is visible to the Public and that your account is Verified. 
• Consistent Branding - Make sure branding is visually appealing and consistent across all platforms. Use the same colour palette or filter for all images. Try using images that are bold, eye catching and effective.
• Research and compare competitors social media profiles, what's working and not working for your competitors. Also research and find inspiration from other outside sources on social media. 

iASP Central Example: You have conducted a social media audit and analysed your three top competitors social media profiles. From the analysis, you can see that all of your competitors are using still-format images for their Facebook cover image. 

After researching video content, you understand that video is the highest engaging form of content on Facebook. 

You perceive a potential opportunity and decide to use a short-video feature for the Facebook cover image. This creates a point of difference from your competitors SM profiles and helps grab the attention of your fans when viewing your Page. 

Step 2. Execute SMM Activities

Running multiple integrated SMM activities requires high-level organisation and management skills. 

Organisation is the key to executing a solid strategy.

Part Four - How to Plan Social Media Marketing Tactics, can help you plan and develop a SMM strategy further, including: 

• The SMM Activities to be carried out, including a template to help monitor activities throughout the process
• A projected budget and template to help monitor spend during the execution stage  
• A plan of the content to be released on social media, including an Editorial Content Calendar 
• Delegated roles and responsibilities

Prior to the execution phase commencing, it' important to have a clear plan of the activities carried out and who is responsible. 

If you have a team helping to execute the strategy,  ensure they understand their individual roles and responsibilities during the process.

This will help keep SMM activities on track and running smoothly.

Nominating a project manager can also help to lead a team, monitor marketing activities and meet set goals.    

Good communication is vital when executing a strategy. 

Effective communication can help a team understand the challenges of the project, what's working well and how to best provide support if required. 

If you've selected a project manager, they can track and report on performance, help deliver completion of SMM tasks and  identify any potential problems.

When executing SMM activities, it's important to:

• Refer to the strategy and goals to stay on target 
• Analyse SMM activities and report on them weekly. If necessary, adjust SMM activities that are not performing
• Monitor budget and marketing spend throughout execution
• Stay active on social media - Post regular content, engage with audience and be timely in your responses 
• Use templates and worksheet to help stay organised - Editorial Content Calendars,  Budget Spreadsheets, Runsheets etc. 
• Monitor and report on KPIs
• Communicate effectively with team members

iASP Central Tip:  Using an Editorial Content Calendar can help keep you organised during the execution stage. We have provided some example templates in the resources section of this article below. 

Step 3. Measure and Report on Performance

Analysing SMM activity performance throughout the execution process can help save efforts, costs and time. 

Examining data can allow you to make educated changes to SMM activities.

It's important to know which activities are generating return on investment (ROI) and which aren't. 

From here, non-performing activities can be changed or replaced by better performing SMM activities. 

So what types of analytics are available and relevant to SMM performance? 

• Facebook Analytics
• Instagram Insights
• Twitter Analytics 
• Google Analytics 
• LinkedIn Analytics 
• Buffer Analytics / Hootsuite Analytics / Sprout Social Analytics 

iASP Central Example: 'Skin Beauty' is an online e-store specialising in skin care products. The marketing team are planning to run a Facebook Ad to help increase sales for their skin care product. They decide to create an image ad aimed at a broad audience of women from 15 - 55 years old with interests in skin care. They set the ad budget to a maximum of $50 per day to help improve the visibility of the Ad.  

Two weeks into the ad campaign, the team review Facebook Insights and the ad performance. Upon reviewing Insights, they can see that the majority of clicks and interactions with the Ad are from women aged 18-25yrs old. While they are reaching the max budget spend every day, they are unsure if these clicks are converting into sales. 

Therefore the team decide to adjust the Ad target audience age group to 18-25yrs old and lower the daily spend to $25per day. 

This will increase the likelihood of Ads being displayed to a more narrow and defined target audience. They then focus on using the extra $25 to set up a Facebook Re-marking Campaign for visitors who visit the website and view this product. 

Using Google Analytics they can then track and monitor the conversion rate of customers who purchase directly rom the Facebook Ad. 

Facebook Insights and Google Analytics have helped the team monitor their SMM performance and generate the best ROI.

Team KPIs 

Holding a weekly catch up with your SMM team can help keep your team and SMM activities on track. 

It provides an opportunity to review and report on SMM activity performance, team contributions and concerns. 

Using a Social Media Report can help track performance and important data. We have provided a SMM Report Template in the References section of this article. 

When meeting with your team for a Work in Progress (WIP) update, report on the following: 

• SMM Activity performance and analytics 
• Goal and Objective tracking 
• Team KPIs
• Potential obstacles and ETAs

Collect Important Customer Data 

When reviewing social media analytics and reporting weekly,  it's important to collect information about your customers. 

Collecting and analysing data about your target audience will help future campaign success. 

Collect information from your customers including Email Address, Location, Interests etc.  

Using a Facebook Lead Form or Facebook Poll can help you gain insight into your customers and your services. 

Compile customer data to form data bases. Segment your lists into new customers and existing customers. This information can be utilised to create email marketing campaigns in the future. 

Report on the customer data collected during your team catch ups. 

Now it's time to put your plan into action…

Deliver your strategy with precision and accuracy. 

Remember the key components of a strong execution are: 

• Organisation
• Team communication
• Detailed plan of SMM activities 
• Understanding team roles and responsibilities 
• Measuring and reporting on performance  
• Adjust and make changes where relevant 

Analyse and make changes to your plan and activities as you go, to ensure the best ROI. 

Have you executed a SMM strategy before? How did you execute your plan effectively?

Let us know on the iASP Central Facebook Page or Get in Touch.

References:

How to Create an Extraordinary Social Media Strategy for 2018

Implement a Marketing Plan

6 Steps to Successfully Execute a Strategy 

6 Essential Steps for Executing Your Social Media Strategy

7 Steps in Creating a Winning Social Media Marketing Strategy in 2018

Templates: 

Social Media Analytics Report Template 

Create a Social Media Content Calendar 

Welcome to the fourth edition of the iASP Central series How to Create a Social Media Marketing Strategy.

If you've just joined in, you can catch up on previous articles:

• Part One - How to Perform a Social Media Audit
• Part Two - How to Set Goals and Objectives
• Part Three - How to Identify Key Target Audiences

Join us as we continue with Part Four - How to Plan Social Media Marketing (SMM) Tactics.

Part Four - How to Plan Social Media Marketing Tactics

When planning a SMM strategy, it's important to develop and implement effective marketing communication tactics.

SMM tactics are the action steps carried out to achieve set goals and objectives. These steps help to execute a strategy.

Marketing tactics are often referred to as marketing activities, strategic methods or promotional tactics. 

Marketing activities can help communicate important messages to specific target audiences.

For example, if you wanted to sell a product to a target audience on Facebook, sending a strategic marketing message about the product's features and benefits could help increase sales. In order to effectively communicate this message, the following SMM activities could be used:

• Facebook Content Posts
• Facebook Boosted Posts or Adverts
• Facebook Event Invites
• Facebook Re-marketing

With a large volume of social media marketing platforms and media available, it can be tricky to know which will marketing activities will drive the best return on investment (ROI).

If you've completed Part Two - How to Set Goals and Objectives and Part Three - How to Identify Key Target Audiences, you may have a better understanding of the goals and the target audience you want to reach.

The next step is to start planning the SMM activities that will support this strategy.

When choosing marketing activities, it's important to select activities that are relevant to your audience and business values.

Follow iASP Central's 7 key steps to help formulate marketing activities that drive results:

Step 1. Set up a SMM Activity Template

The first step is to set up a marketing activitiy template or spreadsheet.

This template can be used to plan and record the marketing activities that will be carried out.

Running multiple activities over a period of time is often an effective way to get marketing messages out there. It's important to stay organised when running different activities, so an activity spreadsheet will come in handy.

Here are some suggestions to include on your spreadsheet:

• Marketing activities undertaken e.g. Targeted Facebook content posts
• Platforms used e.g. Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Google+
• Target audience
• Person responsible e.g. Team member, team or department
• Expected completion date
• Success indicator e.g. How will you tell if the activity is successful? What metric or goal must be met?
• Cost of marketing activity

A spreadsheet can help to monitor activities and performance throughout a campaign. It can help a team understand their individual roles, as well as a place to contribute information.

iASP Central Tip: If you don't have time to create a template from scratch, there are a number of free templates available for download. We have provided some links in the Resources list at the end of the article.

Step 2. Plan SMM Activities and Channels

Start planning the SMM activities you will carry out and list them on the spreadsheet created in Step 1.

This step relates directly to your goals set out in Part Two and the identified target audiences outlined in Part Three.

When planning SMM activities, remember to consider the following:

• What message are you trying to communicate?
• Who is your audience on social media?
• What is the best platform to use?
• What is the key time to reach your audience?
• What is your end goal?
• What date do you want to achieve your goal by?

On your spreadsheet, write down the marketing activities that will be performed and the relevant social media channels to be used.

Remember to list the expected time arrival (ETA) for the completion of each activity.

iASP Central Tip: There many ways to send marketing messages via social media platforms. Here are some suggestions:

• Targeted Content Posts
• Advertising or boosted posts
• Lead Forms
• Social Groups or Communities
• Re-marketing
• Event Invites
• Cross promotional posts

When planning activities, it's important that the activities undertaken are relevant to your target market, strategy and business values.

Step 3. Assign Team Roles

Assigning team roles and responsibilities is an important part of planning SMM activities.

A team's contribution and efforts can impact on the overall success of a campaign.

Assign roles to team members that reflect their strengths, build confidence and motivate.

Ensure that you provide your team with clear and detailed information about their specific role and responsibilities.

When running multiple marketing activities, it's vital that team members understand:

• Their individual role and expectations
• Team roles and how team members are contributing
• Overall goals the team is planning to achieve as a collective

There are many SMM roles that can be undertaken when running activities, here are some just to name a few:

• Content Development
• Community Manager or overseer
• Social Media Advertising
• Analytics and Reporting
• Campaign Strategy

Once you have organised individual and team roles, write them down on the Spreadsheet created in Step 1.

Step 4. Set a Budget

Developing a budget is a vital part of SMM planning.

A marketing budget can help track spend, funds allocation and generated revenue.

It also helps to keep a team on target, and avoid over spending.

Before starting any SMM activities, try to estimate the projected costs of each activity. If your goal is to make sales, calculate how many sales are required in order to cover the cost of the marketing activities undertaken.

Tracking spend while running activities can help work out the ROI or where funds could potentially be better spent.

iASP Central Tip:There are lots of marketing budget templates available online. We have included some below in the resources section of this article.

Step 5. Plan SMM Content

The final step is to research and plan the content that will be released on social media.

Content is the foundation of any SMM strategy. It's a powerful tool that can help engage target markets, drive messages and create demand.

Content is the information or media distributed via marketing platforms. Content can include images, text, video, e-books, downloadable documents etc.

Content Marketing is the practice of developing strategic content to communicate marketing messages to an audience.

When developing a content plan, it's important to create content that is relevant, educational and engaging.

So how can you create high-quality, effective content?

Follow iASP Centrals Key Tips:

Research Competitor's Content!

Knowing and understanding what content is working, and not working, for your competitors can give you a head start!

As suggested in Part 1 of our series, completing a social media audit can help you reflect and evaluate on your current position in the social media landscape. It also allows you to analysepotential opportunities for content development.

Find Content Inspiration!

Conduct research within your industry to find content that inspires you!

Finding content ideas can help to create fresh, interesting and trending content that will allow you to engage your audience more effectively.

We suggest using BuzzSumo, an online keyword tool that allows you to find popular relative content on the web.

Hashtag research can also help you discover new content to draw inspiration from. We recommend using toolsKeyhole and RiteTag to conduct hashtag research.

Use an Editorial Content Calendar!

An Editorial Content Calendaris a schedule of the content you plan to release on social media.

It helps keep content organised and provides a clear outline of the date and time content will be released.

When running a SMM campaign, a content calendar can help keep content on track and ensure it's consistent and timely.

Plan and list content on the calendar including:

• Type of Content Post - E.g.Video, Blog Post, Live Video, Image Post
• Social Media Platform -E.g. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn
• Target Audience - E.g. You may have more than one Target Market you're trying to reach on social media, so list which specific audience your post intends to reach
• Marketing Message E.g. What is the marketing message conveyed? Does the post promote a specific product or service?
• Release Date and Time
• Scheduled Post Information E.g. Is this post scheduled for release? What platform is is scheduled on? Buffer, Hootsuite, Facebook Scheduled Posts?
• Engagement Levels E.g. How many likes, shares or interactions did the post receive

iASP Central Tip: There are many Editorial Content Calendars available online for download, we have provided some links in our resources section at the end of this article.

Create Unique Content!

Content is everywhere online!

Therefore, creating unique 'standout' content is the trick to getting a message across.

Content Creation can be time consuming and costly, especially if it involves design or a team collaboration.

However there are a number of online tools available to help assist with writing and designing content.

We suggest using Canva,a free design tool to createeye-catching visual content or branded images. Canva is an easy-to-use online program that allows you to design content posts and images specifically for social media. You can also post directly from the platform to a social media profile or page.

When creating written content, establish a unique voice and tone that correlates with your target audience.

For example, if your target audience age group is between 50-75years old, it would not be appropriate to use modern slang or catch phrases in your language and written content. Adopting a more mature tone could help relate to this audience.

To write catchy headlines or subjects for your content, we recommend using Hubspot's Blog Idea's Generator or Coschedule's Headline Analyser.

Hemmingway Editor is a free grammar tool that highlights grammar errors and makes suggestions to simply sentences. We use this tool regularly at iASP Central when creating content, as it helps to keep sentences clear and succinct.

Use a Social Media Scheduling Tool!

Social media scheduling tools allow you to manage and organise social media posts from one place.

We suggest Buffer or Hootsuite as our top social media scheduling tools. These platforms allow you to streamline posts and schedule for release ahead of time.

Using an editorial content calendar along with a social media scheduling tool will keep your content and team organised.

To Sum it Up....

Plan, develop and implement SMM tactics that support your strategy.

When planning marketing activities, budget and content,use the available marketing templates to help assist you and keep organised.

Ensure the activities carried out relate directly to your target audience, goals and business values.

Join us next time for Part 5, as we focus on the execution of SMM tactics and how to review and report on key analytics throughout the process.

Have you developed social media marketing tactics before? How did you implement them?

What marketing activities did you use?

Let us know on the iASP Central Facebook Page or Get in Touch.

References:

• How to Build an All-Star Social Media Team in 5 Steps
• The 25 Top Social Media Management Tools for Businesses of All Sizes
• 26 Tips to Create a Strong Social Media Content Strategy

Marketing Activity Templates:

• How To Plan Your Marketing Budget With Six Free Templates
• Marketing Plan Template and Guide
• 7 Social Media Templates to Save You Hours of Work
• 
  

Budget Template:

• How to Manage Your Entire Marketing Budget [Free Budget Planner Templates]
• 8 Marketing Budget Templates

Editorial Content Calendar:

• Free Editorial Calendar Templates
• How To Make 2017 Super Organized With An Easy Content Calendar Template
• How to Create a Social Media Content Calendar: Tips and Templates

Welcome to the third edition of the iASP Central series How to Create a Social Media Strategy.

Effective Social Media Marketing often starts with a detailed plan.

Creating a strategy can help drive goals, marketing activities and measure success.

If you've just joined in, here is a quick recap of iASP Central's six steps to creating a Social Media Marketing (SMM) Strategy:

1. Auditing
2. Goals
3. Target Audiences
4. Planning
5. Execution
6. Reviewing

In Part One - How to Perform a Social Media Audit, we reviewed social media profiles to determine which are generating the best return on investment (ROI).

Part Two - How to Set Goals and Objectives addressed the importance of creating detailed, specific goals using the S.M.A.R.T formula.

Next we focus how to identify target audiences, in order to develop effective marketing communication tactics.

Part Three - How to Identify Key Target Audiences

Engaging the right target audience is vital to SMM success.

Platforms such as Facebook and Twitter use the term Audience to refer to fans, followers or a broader social community.

Companies target specific audiences via marketing messages, through traditional media channels like television or radio, or online media channels like Facebook or e-Mail.

A target audience is a group of people who are likely to be interested in your product, service or offer, and who will be the target or focus of your campaign.

For example, you might target single men for a Valentine's Day promotion, or you might target working mums for a new product you are launching.

A target audience is often also referred to as a Target Market, a Target Group, or Focus Group.

Getting your marketing messages to the right people can be a tricky task! It can be the difference between marketing failure or success.

Marketing messages aim to influence, engage, educate or persuade consumers to react in a specific way. For example - to buy a product or to provide an email address.

But even the most creative SMM campaigns can fail if messages are not communicated to the right target audience.

To get the most out of a SMM initiative, it's important to understand an audience's demographics and underlying motivations.

Identifying key target audiences can help develop effective marketing messages and maximise ROI.

So what method can you use to help identify target audience?

We've put together a 8 step process to guide you:

Step 1. Define a Target Audience

The more you know about customers, the easier it will be to engage with them.

Ask yourself who are you targeting?

Brainstorm the following:

• Who is your ideal customer? Who would benefit or enjoy your new product / service / offer the most? How would you describe them?
  
• List their demographics including: Age Group, Gender, Occupation, Interests, Geographic Location, Income, Education, Values.
  
• What products or services are they interested in? Why?
  
• What social media platforms do they use?
  
• Are they desktop or mobile users?
  
• What patterns or similarities can you conclude?
  

Brainstorming practices can help create and identify different market groups. And you may end up targeting different groups with different SMM campaigns.

The practice of grouping customers who exhibit similar traits or interests is called Customer Segmentation.

By segmenting customers into groups, unique buying personas can be developed to engage them.

If you're having trouble identifying a market group, try these iASP Central Tips:

• Review your Social Media Analytics
  
  Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn all feature analytics tools with detailed audience information.
  
  The Facebook Insights People tab features information on Fans, Followers and People Reached including age, gender and location.
  
  Twitter Analytics - Audience Insights provides key metrics in age, interests, language, lifestyle and gender.
  
  Twitter Analytics' Add a Comparison Audience tool compares audience demographics and interests to a broad Twitter audience.
  
  
• Conduct a Survey or Pole
  
  Surveys are a great way to learn more about an audience on social media.
  
  Create a survey or poll to gain information about your audience, their likes, dislikes and thoughts on products and services.
  
  Twitter Pole is a tool to create voting poll posts. Poll answers can be viewed publicly or privately.
  
  Facebook apps My Polls and Simple Surveys are great tools to create unique surveys on Facebook.
  
  Survey Monkey is an online survey platform that can be integrated with social media and email marketing.

Step 2 - Understand Audience Motivations

Understanding an audience's motivations is an integral part of developing and identifying target groups.

Customer motivations are desires or needs that can drive a customer to purchase.

By identifying the motivations of an audience, it can be easier to establish how you can help them.

Creating a Buying Persona is a great way to predict the needs of your customer.

A Buying Persona is creative description or characterisation of your ideal customer, their behaviours and emotions.

To create a Buying Persona, it's helpful to think from the customer's perspective.

Ask yourself:

• What help does the customer need? What problem do they need solved?
• How do they feel? What behaviours do they exhibit?
• What drives or motivates them to use social media?
• What motivates them to buy?

Creating a buying persona can help develop a deeper understanding of a customer, their buying behaviour and how you can address their needs.

iASP Central Tip:Product Knowledge is key!

Product knowledge is very important.

Once audience motivations are established, you can best match a product or service to suit their needs.

Make sure you know the features and benefits of the products your marketing or selling.

iASP Central Example:

Fictional Scenario: An online e-store Beauty4Us sells all organic beauty products in Australia. They want to promote a new skin product via a SMM campaign.

Target Audience: After brainstorming they have identified their key target market as young women, aged between 15-35years old, with interests in beauty care and health.

Buying Persona: Young women who are looking to buy quality organic skin products, who value eco-friendly products at an affordable price. This audience is interested in understanding ingredients used in the product and how it can benefit their skin.

Motivation: This target audience is driven to find an affordable, organic skin solution online.

By pre-determining customer motivations and behaviours, effective marketing messages can be developed to appeal to their needs.

Step 3 - Create a Value Proposition

This step relates closely to your overall goals and objectives that were set out in Part Two.

Once the motivations and buying behaviours of a target market have been established, focus on why you want to reach this group.

What is your main motivation?

• To sell a product
• To build brand recognition / reputation
• To promote a service or product
• To create a lead or establish a relationship with a customer
• Build social media engagement

Always keep goals in mind when developing target groups. It's important that objectives align with your customer's needs.

A Value Proposition is a statement that explains why a customer would want to buy a product or service. It's a unique statement that sets you aside from competitors, and explains the value a customer receives from your services.

Creating a unique Value Proposition is a great way to help your team better understand a target audience.

Step 4 - Research Competitor's Audiences

Conduct research to establish who competitors are targeting on social media.

In Part One - How to Perform a Social Media Audit we identify the social media platforms your competitors are utilising.

Using the audit results, review your competitor's profiles and report on the following:

• Who is engaging with your competitiors content?
  
  e.g. Are people in certain demographics appearing more than others, such as a specific gender group, or age group, or people within or around a particular location?
  
  
• How is their audience engaging with content?
  
  e.g. Are they liking, commenting, disliking or sharing the content?
  
  
• What type of content are your competitors using?
  
  e.g. Is your competitor using image posts or video posts? What content is gaining the most attention? What language and tone are they using for their social media posts? What content is least effective?
  
  
• What conclusions can you draw from reviewing competitors profiles?
  
  e.g. What content is most effective? What key demographics and interests do their audiences share? What motivates their audience to respond to content?
  
  
• Who are your competitors tagging and engaging with?
  
  e.g. Are your competitors using cross posting or tagging social influencers? Do they post in social Groups or on specific Pages? Do they tag partnerships, sponsors or charities in posts?

By reviewing your competitor's social media activity, you can gain valuable audience information. Formulate different target groups based on your competitors audiences.

This will help you to find if you will be targeting the same audience groups as your competitor, or identify new audience groups that your competitor isn't targetting.

iASP Central Tip:

SemRush is a great social media tool for analysing competitor's Audience Insights . It provides detailed metrics on competitor's audience growth and key demographics.

Step 5 - Determine Audience's SM Platform(s)

Establish where your audience is 'hanging out' on social media.

Research the following:

• Review social media analytics and locate where your chosen target audience spends the most time E.g. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Pinterest or Snapchat. It may not always be the Big 4 social media platforms.
  
  
• Do your social media followers visit the company website?
  
  
• Do they read the company blog or email marketing?
  
  
• What other websites do they spend time on?

By understanding where an audience is spending time online, strategic marketing activities can be developed to reach them.

iASP Central Tip:Review Google Analytics!

Google Analytics is a free tool that can track and measure website and social network performance analytics. It allows you to track traffic to specific website pages and social media.

iASP Central Example:

Fictional Scenario: e-Store Beauty4Us research shows that their target audience of women aged 15-35yrs old are spending the a lot of their time on Instagram.

After reviewing Google Analytics they can tell this target group are also spending time on a beauty blog website, and are often viewing their video content.

Therefore creating video content and sharing it via Instagram could be an effective method to attract and engage this target audience.

Step 6 - Establish the Best Time to Target

What is the best time to reach your audience?

When are they on social media? Day, night, lunch or a specific time?

Publish your content and posts on social media at optimal times when most of your target audience is active on a social media platform.

iASP Central Tip:

Review social media analytics and find out when your audience is most active online.

Facebook Insights: The Local tab allows you to view the peak times a local audience is using and engaging on Facebook.

Buffer: Buffer is a social media scheduling tool which has a paid analytics option, to track audience insights from social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Google+. Buffer can provide metrics on the peak times to post content.

Step 7 - How to Reach an Audience

Determine the methods you will use to reach an audience.

How will you reach your audience? What methods will you use to contact them?

There are many ways to reach audiences via social media including:

• Facebook Lead Ads - create a Lead Ads form that directs customers to a sign-up Form or direct webpage contact form.
  
  
• Facebook Advertising and Instagram Advertising - create content targeted adverts that can be delivered to specific target audiences. Import customer's email addresses and create Custom Target Audiences and Look-a-like Audiences to directly target your market group.
  
  
• Facebook Preferred Audience Tool - Create targeted posts to reach an organic audience using this tool.
  
  
• Twitter Advertising - Create geo-targeted posts using details such as location, language, interests and country.
  
  
• LinkedIn Advertising - create persona groups on LinkedIn and advertise directly to them.
  
  
• Facebook Pixel - Installing Facebook Pixel allows you to re-market and track conversions. Display an ad who have recently visited your website or Facebook page. This is a great way to remind customers to take action after engaging with your brand.

Step 8 - Build a Relationship with Audience

The final step focuses on building a relationship with your audience and establishing trust.

Creating good content and reaching your audience via advertising is a great way to gain an audience's attention. However it's important to consider how you will get your audience to take the next step and convert them into a lead.

Establishing a personal connection with your audience is key. To do this, try to provide an offer or something of benefit to your audience. This is often referred to in marketing as a 'hook'. Showcase your customer service skills by offering value and assistance.

Think about the following:

• How can you build trust with your audience?
  
  Respond to your audiences comments and queries in a timely, professional and personable manner. This can help establish trust and build rapport with individuals. Remember to respond as a 'real person,' be genuine in your approach and use language that is casual yet professional.
  
  
• What can you offer your audience? What could you offer of benefit?
  
  Think about what you could offer your audience to establish a personal connection. Here are some examples:
  • Free one-on-one consultation to expand further on your services
  • Downloadable ebook with tips on your industry and how you can best help your customer
  • Tip sheet or downloadable PDF document
  • Discount or limited offer on services
  • Giveaway or competition
  
  
  
• How will you turn a lead into a prospect? How will you follow up?
  
  Once you have established an offer, consider how you will follow up with your audience once you provide the offer.
  
  How do you plan to contact your audience?
  • Phone Call
  • Email
  • Newsletter
  • Printed letter or pamphlet
  • Text
  
  
  Organise your follow up method before you create the offer.
  
  In order to follow up, it's important to collect customer contact details. Incorporate this in your offer.
  
  e.g. If you are creating an offer on Facebook, we suggest linking the offer to a website Contact Form. A contact form will collect important contact details such as name, address, contact number and email. Once a form has been completed, the offer can be claimed. This provides you an opportunity to follow up in a more personal way and grow your relationship.

To conclude...

A well defined Target Audience can help ensure SMM messages are being sent to the right people.

By identifying the key demographics, behaviours and motivations of an audience, marking messages can be tailored to reach them.

This 8 Step process will help provide the main framework for a SMM strategy.

Join us next time as we focus on 'How to Plan and Execute Marketing Activities.'

Have you created target groups or audiences for SMM before?

What methods did you use?

Let us know on the iASP Central Facebook Page or Get in Touch.

Resources:

• Your Guide to Social Media Targeting Via Sprout
• The Complete Guide To Building Your Personal Brand
• 6 Steps To Decoding Your Target Audience
• How to Find Your Target Audience on Social Media

Welcome to the second edition of the iASP Central series How to Create a Social Media Marketing Strategy.

Our journey began with 'Part One - How to Perform a Social Media Audit'

Part One provided an overview on how to perform a social media audit, in order to establish which social media profiles are generating return on investment (ROI) for your business. 

This time we're exploring setting goals and objectives for a Social Media Marketing (SMM) strategy. 

Part Two - How to Set Goals and Objectives 

SMM can be an effective way to build brand awareness and engage new leads for a business.

To get the most out of any SMM initiative, we suggest creating a plan with clearly defined goals and objectives.

Why set goals and objectives?

Goals are desired outcomes that you want to achieve with your efforts.

Goals provide a framework for a strategy and outline what you aim to accomplish.

Objectives are closely aligned with goals. Objectives are the detailed steps taken in order to achieve the goal.

Setting goals and objectives can be considered an important part of any SMM strategy.

Setting goals and objectives can help:

• provide structure and direction for a strategy

• improve SMM efforts

• challenge and motivate team members

• measure performance and results

So how can you create strong, realistic and challenging goals for you SMM strategy?

The answer: Create S.M.A.R.T Goals!

S.M.A.R.T stands for:

Specific

Measurable

Achievable

Relevant

Time Based

The S.M.A.R.T formula can be applied when creating goals.

S.M.A.R.T goals have a greater chance of being accomplished. 

Why? 

The aim of the goal is clear, specific and easy to understand. 

When goals are clear, it can be easier to apply the efforts required to accomplish the goal.

Broad and undefined goals can leave a SMM strategy lacking direction and clarity.

Let's dive a little deeper into the meaning of S.M.A.R.T...

Specific - Be specific!

When writing your goal, provide as much detail as possible about what you aim to achieve.

Always consider the following:

• Who is involved in achieving the goal?

• Who are you targeting?

• What do you specifically want to achieve?

• How will you achieve this goal?

iASP Central Tip: When creating a specific goal for your social media strategy, consider the following:

• What social media platforms you will use? e.g Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn

• Who will help to achieve this goal? e.g. a team or specific team member

• Who is your target audience? e.g. age group, gender, interests, location

Measurable - include a metric in your goal!

Track and measure your performance by including key metrics in your goal. This will allow you to analyse the results.

iASP Central Tip: When adding a metric to a goal, consider the social media platform you are using and the type of metric you want aim for. 

Keep in mind:

• Do you want to increase page likes, engagement, follows or comments?

• What specific metric are you aiming for? e.g. 25 Likes, or 25% percentage increase

• Which analytics tools will you use to measure the results?

We recommend using a social media analytics tool such as Buffer or Hootsuite to measure progress and results. These tools allow you to schedule posts and track important metrics. 

Achievable - Ask yourself is your goal achievable?

A goal can be challenging, but mostly importantly it should be realistic and attainable.

While it is great to have ambitious goals, if a goal is set too high, it can become counter-productive.

Realistic goals can help motivate a team and create a strong work ethic. Realistic goals can create a vision that with hard work, the desired outcome can be achieved.

Setting goals that are 'out of reach' can deter others from working towards the goal. It can also create a notion of failure from the beginning.

iASP Central Tip: When first setting goals for your SMM strategy, we suggest starting out small and try not to overextend the goal.

Goals can be adjusted throughout a SMM campaign.

For example, instead of aiming for a large number of Facebook Likes, such as 1000 New Page Likes in one month, start small with a goal that is in reach.

Review your results from the Social Media Audit performed in Step 1 and create a realistic goal based on this social media performance.

Depending on your Facebook engagement results, you may find that aiming for 60-100 Page Likes in one month is more realistic and achievable.

It may also help to break down the desired outcome into a shorter time-frame. E.g. Aim for 15 likes per week, an approx total of 60 likes per month.

Relevant - Create goals that are relevant!

Ensure goals are relevant to:

• the project or campaign 

• business values 

• target market

• employee skill level and team members

We recommend you steer away from goals that are not relevant to your business or your customer.

iASP Central Example Goal:

• Broad Goal - To create open communication and engagement with our customers via our social media community.

• S.M.A.R.T Goal - To increase customer engagement on Twitter, by aiming for 5 x Mentions per week over the course of 16 weeks. A total of 80 x mentions.

In order to understand the relevance of this goal, let's assume a large majority of your Twitter followers are customers. Therefore the potential to reach your key target audience via Twitter is very high.

The customers who follow your Twitter page are far more likely to engage with your brand, as it is familiar to them. So the goal is relevant to the business and key target audience. 

Now consider this alternative scenario... Your business has a LinkedIn Page that is not maintained regularly. It has a small amount of Followers, which consist mainly of employees.

Therefore reaching customers through the LinkedIn platform would prove to be far more challenging. As the page is not monitored, replying to comments would also be difficult. In this situation, including a LinkedIn goal is not as relevant.

Time-based - Set a deadline for the goal to be accomplished!

A time-based goal can motivate others, as it creates a sense urgency to meet the deadline. Time based goals also help manage team expectations, workloads and prioritising tasks.

After you have created the key goals, list the objectives under each goal. Objectives are the detailed steps you plan to take in order to achieve that goal. See our example below.

iASP Central Goal and Objectives Example:

Broad Goal: To increase brand awareness and build authority through the iASP Central blog

S.M.A.R.T Goal: To gain 100 blog subscribers from 1st August to 30th October 2017, to increase brand awareness and build authority in our social community. An average of 8-9 subscribers per week.

Objectives: 

 In order to achieve this goal, we plan to action the following steps:

• To release regular blog articles. This will provide fresh, interesting and engaging content that may potentially attract new subscribers.

• To run paid Facebook Ads to promote the blog, targeting key demographic groups

• To review Facebook Insights daily to track and analyse campaign results

• To review and report on blog metrics weekly, in order to track new subscribers   

  
  

  That's a Wrap!

  We hope the S.M.A.R.T formula will help you to create clear, realistic and achievable goals for your SMM strategy. 
  
  
  S.M.A.R.T goals can help you get the most out of your efforts and help to motivate a team.      
  
  
  Have you set goals and objectives for a SMM strategy before? What method did you use?

  Let us know on the iASP Central Facebook Page or Get in Touch.

  
  

  Join us next time when we return for Part 3 of the series 'Identifying Key Target Audiences' 

  
  

  
  

  
  

  Resources:

  
  

  How to Create Achievable Social Media Goals

  9 Social Media Goals You Can Set for Your Business (and How to Track Them)

  4 Social Media Goals Every Business Should Measure

  7 Popular Goal-Setting Strategies That Will Help You Achieve Great Things on Social Media

  
  

  Don't Just Create Social Media Goals - Reach Them

  
  
  
  

Welcome to the iASP Central blog series that will teach you How to Create a Social Media Marketing Strategy.

Social Media can be an effective tool for communicating and sharing information online with current and potential stakeholders in your enterprise.

When businesses promote or advertise through these platforms, it's called Social Media Marketing or SMM.

Social media marketing (SMM) is a great way to reach new and existing customers. It can also provide an opportunity to send important messages about your products and services.

Being active on social media and posting regular content isn't a guarantee that you will capture the attention of customers (unfortunately!)

There is a vast amount of content available on social media. It can be tricky to stand out. So it's essential your marketing efforts are generating the best results.

One of the best ways to make sure you're on the right path is to create a strategy!

A well structured strategic plan could be considered a vital starting point of any SMM initiative.

Developing a strategy can be a short exercise or a detailed and lengthy process, depending on what you aim to achieve with your social efforts. In either case, the exercise may prove to be invaluable. A strategy can provide direction, help examine customer behaviours and measure performance.

We will cover all six steps in this weekly series, to provide you with guidance and tools to help create a killer SMM strategy!

Not sure where to start? Read on as we begin with part one, a Social Media Audit.

Part One - How to Perform a Social Media Audit 

Our first step in creating a SMM Strategy is to perform a Social Media Audit.

Why?

An audit is an opportunity to review, reflect and evaluate your current position in the social media landscape.

It can reveal which social media platforms and practices are working for your business and which are not.

Auditing can also get your social media efforts back on track and help establish a plan based on your required outcomes.

After all there is no point creating an action plan, unless you have reviewed your current performance!

The aim of this audit is to find out which profiles generate the best return on investment (ROI).

Some businesses make the mistake of having too many social media profiles. This can end up becoming time-consuming, costly to maintain or forgotten all together. This is not always the best practice and can impact the return on investment (ROI) that media engagement delivers.

Instead we recommend researching social media platforms most relevant to your industry and your customers. Invest time into the ones that work for your business.

If you are starting in social media, you may want to begin with one or two platforms. Facebook or Google + are commonly used for enterprises.

Then once you are happy with their performance, you can look for opportunities on other platforms.

To further help, we have compiled a list of online analytics tools and templates to get started.

Follow these steps and you could be auditing in no time!

Step 1 - Set up a Social Media Audit Template

The first step of this audit is to set up an audit template or spreadsheet.

Use an audit template to record the data in one place, which will make it easier to review later on.

You can download a template or even create your own simple spreadsheet.

Record, organise and compare data collected throughout the audit process on the spreadsheet.

A spreadsheet is also easy for team mates to access and contribute to.

iASP Central Tip: If you don't have time to create one from scratch, there are a number of free templates available for download. We have provided some links in the Resources list at the end of the article.

Step 2 - Identify Social Media Profiles

List them on the audit template or spreadsheet you set up in Step 1.

Remember that Pinterest account you may have created a few years ago but never used? Can't remember exactly? Could a past employee or family member may have set up a profile without your knowledge? Well let's find out.

How?

Perform a Google Search to locate the social media profiles associated with your business.

It's important to know which profiles exist, even if they haven't been maintained or updated recently.

This can help determine which profiles are beneficial and worth maintaining, versus those that aren't.

List the accounts on the spreadsheet, including the URLs and passwords.

Step 3 - Review Social Media Analytics

Reviewing analytics is an important step of this audit.

Analytics measure overall patterns, behaviours and performance.They convey how well a social profile is performing.

Analytics can include various metrics such as Reach & Frequency: The size and demographics of your audience and how often they were exposed to your campaign and Engagement: The actions users took such as new Facebook Likes or new Twitter Followers, sharing your content with others or visiting your corporate webpage

Where can you find analytics for social media?

Sometimes there is so much data available, it can be difficult to know what is the most valuable.

To figure this out, ask yourself what you're aiming to achieve through each social media profile?

At iASP Central, we focus most efforts on Facebook and Twitter.

Our primary target audience consists of current and potential customers for the iASP Technology Platform, which facilitates publication of corporate websites, e-stores and enterprise software applications.

Our current strategy is to engage our social media community, by building a hub of informational resources valuable to our clients.

Therefore the primary metrics we measure audience and engagement, number of followers and the amount of mentions the content we publish generates.

This is some of the data we find most useful to record at iASP Central:

iASP Central Tip: Facebook Insights feature a data export tool, that allows you to export a summery of analytics to a spreadsheet. It features a date range and data type export option, that provides data specific information on engagement, reach, impressions and more.

Links to these tools are included in the Resources at the bottom of the article.

Step 4 - Review Branding

Review branding across all social media profiles. Is the branding current and consistent?

Write down your findings on the audit spreadsheet.

Step 5 - Monitor Mentions

Find out when and where the business is being 'mentioned' online.

What are mentions?

Mentions are when your business name or relevant keywords are cited on the web. They can appear in social media, search pages, videos and more.

iASP Central Tip: We recommend Mention.com. This free tool provides real-time alerts when your business name is mentioned on social media, websites, blogs and more.

Record top mentions on your spreadsheet.

Step 6 - Research Competitors

Now let's talk benchmarking!

It's time to compare your social media to industry competitors. By reviewing your competitors, you may discover potential strengths, weaknesses and other opportunities in the social media market.

Tools:

Step 7-Compare and Analyse

The final step of the audit is to analyse your findings! Let's take a closer look at your audit spreadsheet.

Audit Complete!

Continue to use your audit spreadsheet to track future data and examine the audit results.

Stay tuned for the next release in the series: How to set S.M.A.R.T Goals - Part Two

Have you completed a social media audit before? Were you surprised by the results?
Let us know on the iASP Central Facebook Page or Get in Touch.

According to this website, there are 119 sleeps until Christmas!!

That's only 17 weeks!

Which means that all you eTailers have even less time to prepare your eStore for the Christmas/Holiday Sale Rush!

The time to start planning is NOW!

There are promotions to decide, marketing campaigns to prepare, and don't even get me started on which wrapping paper to use this year.

We've put together a nice check-list to help you to prepare for your best Christmas Season yet.

#1: Review Last Year

The very first thing you'll want to do is to review the performance of last year's sale.

Undoubtedly, there were some parts that went very well, and other parts that fizzled for one reason or another.

Take this time to identify the positives and the negatives from last year.

Anything you did that was worth repeating, note it down and add it into your 2015 strategy. And the mistakes that you don't want to repeat, create contingency plans to ensure they don't get repeated.

Then after reviewing your own performance, the next step is to review your competitors.

Look at how they approached the silly season sale. Are there any lessons to be learnt from mistakes they made? Or some clever ideas that you can take some inspiration from?

#2: Check Your Sales Data

Have a look at your sales history for the year.

Identify your top customers, because you'll want to specifically target them to boost your sales, as well as offer them a little reward incentive to butter them up as well.

Next, identify your top selling and poorest selling products for the year, and there are two reasons for this.

The first is to help you to select the products to feature in your promotions.

The second is to help identify any possible issues for the performance of your poorest selling products. Is there a stand-out reason why these particular products aren't selling as well?

Maybe the product description isn't informative enough, or the product images need improvement.

Take this opportunity to compare your poorer selling products against your best selling products and improve the content for your poorer sellers.

#3: Review our Twelve Steps to Successful Christmas eTailing

Hopefully you're already up-to-speed with our Twelve Steps to successful Christmas eTailing from last year, and they're already a part of your strategy.

If not, be sure to read them, as they are all still very relevant.

#4: Map out your marketing strategy

Now you want to plan your strategy - the theme of your campaign, the promotions you will offer, when you will start each promotion, and how long each promotion will run for.

Christmas is about rewards and gifts, and just generally being nice, so integrate this into the theme for your campaign.

Shoppers are always looking for the discounts, but think creatively about how customers can earn them, or earn further discounts.

Create some interaction between your business and your customers.

Perhaps a competition on social media could offer a higher discount on top of a regular discount. Or offer a special discount to your Facebook followers that are the most active in your community.

Stacking promotions to encourage sales at the start of the promotion is another effective strategy, offering multiple discounts/specials at the start of the sale period that drop off as the promotion progresses.

Without a doubt, you will also want to offer Free Shipping at some point during the promotion, if not for the entire sale period. Free Shipping will is always a major part of your customer's buying decisions, and is a common sales tactic by your competitors.

#5: Map out your content strategy

It's never a bad time to review and update your content, but now is a great opportunity to give your website content a good spring clean.

You've already decided on the theme for your marketing campaign, now to plan the areas of your website that will need to be updated to reflect your theme.

You may wish to re-write your product pages to be more appropriate to the occasion/theme, or to provide better descriptions that help the customer to make a purchase.

Fresh product images are always a good idea, and can also be used to add to the feel of your theme.

Then there is the banner images on the homepage that are going to draw and direct your customers to your featured specials. What marketing message will you want to display? Which products will you feature?

If you have a Blog or News section, prepare a plan for the articles that you will publish during the campaign. Plan dates will they be published, and decide on the images that be used in the articles.

#6: Map out your e-Mail campaigns

Now that you have your marketing strategy set out, it's time to plan your e-Mail campaigns.

Following on from Step 2, we recommend making two lists of subscribers - Your best customers, and your regular subscribers.

Plan to send a campaign to each list a week before your campaign starts, another at the start of the sale, then a third campaign a week or two before the sale ends, and lastly, a final days reminder.

List which products you will include, and write the content for each campaign, and again, decide on the images that be used.

Have everything prepared so that all that remains is the create each campaign and send them.

#7: Map out your social media campaigns

As always, you need to plan social media campaigns to support your marketing and e-Mail campaigns.

Plan out the posts for each of your social media accounts, and prepare the content for each post, and brainstorm the style and message of images that will need to be produced for each post.

You may also want to launch competitions especially for your social media channels to attract your followers.

Lastly, look at utilising Facebook Ads to target your followers, or new followers.

#8: Arrange for content to be produced early

Once you have everything planned and decided, the final step is to arrange for the content you aren't able to produce to be produced for you.

You really don't want to leave this until the last minute, the earlier you can get your designer onto your banners or images, the earlier they will be ready to launch your campaign and the less rush everyone will be in later in the year.

Need some Help? If you would like some help to get your Christmas Promotion into gear, Get in Touch. Or if you have some tips of your own that you'd like to share, join us on the iASP Central Facebook Page.

Further Reading:

• 10 steps to email success at Christmas: Part One
• Celebrate Christmas in July by Preparing Your Store for the Holidays
• Everything You Need for an eCommerce Holiday Sale
• 5 Promotional Campaign Ideas to Boost Sales This Holiday Season
• Doing These 5 Things Can Help You Get More Ecommerce Sales This Holiday Season

6 Steps to Better Social Media Campaign ROI

In our last blog article - How Much ROI Should Social Media ROI If Social Media Could ROI? - we considered what a reasonable expectation of return on investment (ROI) from social media is, from the point of view of a small business trying to build and grow their on-line social media community.

To quickly re-cap, we essentially concluded the expectation of a ROI on social media can be like the expectation of winning the lottery. Don't play the game expecting to win, play to be in the game.

Of course you shouldn't leave it all to chance.

Review and analyse the effectiveness of your activities to determine those that generate the most engagement and adapt your strategy to suit.

Counting the number of Likes and Re-tweets each post you publish receives will most likely only result in heartburn and ulcers, but that doesn't mean expecting a ROI for certain social media activities is insane, in fact it's very rational, especially when expectations are framed within the context of the following.

So, let's look at our 6 Steps to Better Social Media Campaign ROI:

Step #1: Set a Goal - What is the primary aim of the campaign? Are you aiming to increase your eStore sales during a promotion? Are you trying to collect new business leads?

Step #2: Define a conversion - What action or result will count as a 'hit'? Following the two examples above, a conversion may be a completed sale, or submission of a Contact Us form.

Step #3: Differentiate & Measure Conversions - If the goals you have set are similar to goals you have for your website, which they likely will be, you need to determine how you will differentiate conversions generated through your social media channels against conversions that were not generated through social media.

In the case of sales, it may be by counting the number of sales that used a particular promotional code that you only publish on your social media channels, or in the case of submitting a form, you may track submissions through a dedicated form or via a shared link that contains a variable. Depending on your analytics tools, you may be able to track visits to your website (or a particular page) that originated from social media websites that end with a completed sale or form submission.

Note: The iASP™ platform features a highly functional affiliate and referral tracking system that automatically tracks the source of visits, enquiries and sales.

Step #4: Calculate your return - How much was each conversion worth?

There are two methods you can use to determine this:

1. Using data: Calculate the average total of the orders you received during the campaign (as per your tracking analytics). Or you can calculate the average lifetime value of the leads that you received over the campaign.
2. Use a guesstimate: If you don't have enough historical data to help you, make an educated guess. For example, how much would you estimate to earn from your new customers? How much would you estimate customers spent?

Step #5: Calculate your investment - How much you spent on the campaign?

Your investment costs will be the total of things like:

• How much it cost to plan, execute and manage the campaign.
• How much it cost for graphic design.
• How much it costs for the analytics tools you are using.
• How much you paid to boost/promote/advertise your posts.

Step #6: Crunch the numbers - Now it's time to calculate your return on investment using the simple formula:

ROI = (Return - Investment) / Investment.

Summary:

Don't be disheartened by the results of any individual campaign, the key is to test and measure and evolve an approach that over time connects and engages with your audience.

Remember that social media can be very hit and miss. In our experience content generates engagement both above and below expectations.

The element that many people seem to overlook in social media analysis is mood and emotion. It changes from time to time in humans, and mood is very difficult to measure because it can be affected very quickly and very easily by factors so far removed that not even those affected couldn't tell they were being affected. For example, my football team just lost, so now I'm not in the mood to read a post I normally would.

The key to success is adaptation and experimentation.

Review your campaigns, try to identify why they did or didn't perform. Keep trying something different and comparing the results.

Resources:

• The Delightfully Short Guide to Social Media ROI
• The ROI of Social Media: A Retrospective

How you ever calculated the ROI of a social media campaign you ran? How did you go? Let's discuss on our iASP Central Facebook Page, or Get in Touch.

It's less than a month until Santa fires up the Reindeer and eTailers should be squarely focussed on the annual Christmas shopping frenzy that's about to begin.

Like a bear fresh from hibernation, the Christmas Shopper is browsing, looking to feed their appetite, searching for the best deals on the gifts that give the most.

To help get your eStore ready for the Christmas shopping rush, HCD is pleased to provide our 12 Steps to successful Christmas eTailing.

Skipping the menial "make sure you have a reliable website that can handle the increased traffic load", and the "get your mobile website up and running" advice (because as HCD clients, we know you have already completed those steps, but if not feel free to get in touch and we'll do our best to help)...

So, here's HCD's Twelve Steps to successful Christmas eTailing:

Step 1: Plan to create an experience

One thing the Christmas Shopper loves more than the joy of buying the perfect gift, is being swept up in the moment while they are doing it.

Think about how you can boost that emotional connection with the customer during their shopping experience, leaving them wanting to a). share their experience with others, and b). come back for more.

Step 2: Put up some decorations

Break out the box of decorations and go over your website to give it a fresh feel.
Some simple but effective ideas are to:

• Create a visual impact - Update or modify images to attract attention and create a new look.
• Rewrite product descriptions - Change the language in your content to suit the moment.
• Fix or remove any broken links - Nothing will lose a Christmas Shopper faster than a broken link.
• Review your Returns Policy - Create reassurance for the Christmas Shopper by highlighting any specific conditions for this time of the year, and make the policy page easy to find.
• Create a special category - Make browsing easy for the Christmas Shopper by putting the hot items front and center.
• Create a Gift Purchasing Guide - Not only does a guide help the Christmas Shopper make a decision, it adds to the shopping experience.

Step 3: Offer Gift Wrapping / Gift Cards

Take away some of the stress for the Christmas Shopper by providing the peace-of-mind in knowing that the hard part of gift giving (wrapping it) is taken care of.

Create a lasting positive experience by going above and beyond expectations. A little effort can go a long way in this respect.

Step 4: Create a Landing Page

Create a Christmas themed landing page on your website to direct the Christmas Shoppers.

Keep it simple, with a clear call-to-action directives that guide customers onto where they need to go.

Step 5: Install a Live Chat plugin

Unlike real stores, eStores can lack that real-time enquiry and resolution that the Christmas Shopper often relies upon.

Adding a Live Chat feature to your website overcomes this, and allows your staff to answer customer queries while they are at your eStore, ready to buy.

Step 6: Entice the Early Shopper with Promotion Codes

The Early Christmas Shopper is typically calm, but has keener senses to sniff out the best bargains and can afford to be choosy.

Offer an early bird special at the start of the promotion to attract their attention, and reward them for being there at the start.

Step 7: Entice the Late Shopper with Last Minute Offers

The Late Christmas Shopper is usually in a panicked state, franticly searching for any deals that are still available.

Have a refreshing offer on hand to attract them over and satisfy their appetite.

Step 8: Sing your Promotion Loudly

Shout out frequently (but not aggressively) with newsletters to the Christmas Shopper to let them know what you have on offer! Your campaigns should run in parallel with the phases of your promotion:

• Send a personalised email to loyal customers, with a special incentive just for them.
• Advise Shoppers of your upcoming promotion start date. Add tips to help in their preparation.
• Advise Shoppers that the promotion has started.
• Advise Shoppers that the promotion has reached the middle, offer more incentives.
• Advise Shoppers that the promotion is about to come to a end (just 1 week to go!!).
• Advise Shoppers that the promotion ends tomorrow.

Step 9: Create a buzz on Social Media

Support your email campaigns with a social media campaign on your selected channels. You could also run a competition around your promotion to add extra buzz and/or incentive.

Keep your audience in the loop about your promotion's progress, and share the mood and festivities to add that personal touch.

Step 10: Give something back

Help the Christmas Shopper get into the festive spirit with the incentive of receiving something in return for their shopping efforts.

Charitable donations are a good additional incentive to offer during the festive time of the year to create a warm, fuzzy feeling of goodwill.

Small freebie items for the Christmas Shopper also work. And nothing works better than a little, unexpected surprise!

Step 11: Communicate the delivery process

Keep the Christmas Shopper in the loop by letting them know when their order is being processed, when their order is being packed, when it has been shipped, and when they can expect delivery.

The clearer the communication, the happier the Shopper.

Step 12: Follow up with post-Christmas rewards and opportunities

The day after Christmas is, of course, when the Christmas Shopper is ready to buy more. Entice your Christmas Shoppers to return by offering rewards or discounts that can be redeemed after Christmas, or even for a January promotion.

Just have some fun!

Your Christmas Promotion needn't be as stressful as your Christmas shopping.

With a little planning, and well-timed execution, your promotion should run as smoothly as Christmas at Grandma's house.

Spread the joy, share the love, and feed your Christmas Shoppers a feast they'll want to come back for.

Need some Help? If you would like some help to get your Christmas Promotion into gear, Get in Touch. Or if you have some preparation advice of your own that you think we missed, share them with us on the iASP Central Facebook Page.

As the saying goes: business is booming somewhere, you just have to find it.

The Internet has removed many barriers to International business, allowing trade virtually anywhere and at any time and Social media provides business with platforms to communicate and interact with customers like never before.

So it makes sense that if you are going to trade internationally, your business should also socialise internationally.

Global Social Media Communities

In an article published just last year, eMarketer estimates that by 2017, 2.33 billion people will use social media networks around the world.

While Facebook and Twitter are household names in Australia, other countries have developed their own on-line communities.

China, for example, banned websites like Facebook and Twitter, yet nearly half the population are active on their local social media networks. That's over half a billion users that can't be reached through Facebook.

Other countries also have smaller social media networks that are popular amongst niche groups of people, for example Google+ in the United States.

With a little planning and preparation, new business opportunities can be created by branching out into social media communities that would typically be overlooked.

The 5 Steps to Get There

Planning and executing a global Social Media Strategy for an international target audience is very similar to planning and executing a Social Media Strategy for a local audience.

There are 5 steps to follow before joining any international social media network (with a few points to consider along the way):

1. Select your target country and target audience.
   
   Points to Consider:
   
   
   • What language will you communicate in?
     
     Targeting countries that speak English will be easier, but don't dismiss countries that speak a foreign language just for that reason. There are many translation services that can be used, such as Google Translate, or see it as an opportunity to learn a new language.
     
     
   • What cultural differences should you be aware of?
     
     The last thing you want to do is offend your audience, so take the time to learn what is acceptable, and what is not. You don't want to get caught out giving the O.K sign when it doesn't mean O.K in a different language.
     
     
2. Identify and join the networks used most frequently by that target audience.
   
   Points to Consider:
   
   
   • How does the audience use a particular social media platform?
     
     Take the time to learn how your selected audience use and connect on their preferred platform. For example, is it professionals networking, is it a forum style platform, or is it used like Facebook?
     
     
   • Individual or combined social media accounts?
     
     Think about whether you will make one account and post all content from it or make different local accounts for each country you are targeting. It might help to hire a social media manager who will be able to keep track of multiple accounts and respond to queries on all of them.
     
     
3. Create and share content that appeals to that target audience.
   
   Points to Consider:
   
   
   • Individual or shared content?
     
     Different audiences will respond to different content. You can maintain consistency by sharing the same content across audiences, but ideally, create content that is tailored for your individual audience tastes.
     
     
4. Engage and communicate with the target audience regularly.
   
   Points to Consider:
   
   
   • How will you manage the different time zones?
     
     Social Media requires interaction - joining conversations, replying to comments, and reacting to situations as they unfold. How will you business manage these events outside of opening hours?
     
     
5. Measure progress. Refine and repeat.
   
   Points to Consider:
   
   
   • How will you measure progress?
     
     Just as you are tracking and measuring your progress on local social media platforms, how will you manage your key performance indicators on other social platforms?
     
     

You could combine several countries into one strategy and target a shared audience; or you could have individual strategies for each country, allowing you to target individual audiences with greater focus.

Get Out There, Be Seen, Say Hello

While creating a presence on social media networks in other countries might not result in direct sales immediately, it will create brand recognition and allow you to build reputation in new markets.

Be seen enough, and before too long, people will start to consider your products and services in their buying decisions.

You might not think that your product will sell in other countries, but it could just as easily become the next must-have craze that your local customers didn't catch on to.

Further Resources:

• The Global- Social Media Challenge
• India Leads Worldwide Social Networking Growth
• 5 Steps to Launch Your International Social Media
• The Planet's 24 Largest Social Media Sites, And Where Their Next Wave Of Growth Will Come From
• List of social networking websites

Are you planning to go social in other countries? Share your strategy tips with us on the iASP Central Facebook Page, or Get in Touch.

In a world where more content is generated every day than in all of history up until just a few years ago, content authors must not only instanty grab attention, but maintain engagement for at least long enough to successfully deliver their message.

At Hub Communications Digital content is a big part of our daily life and we've learned a thing or two about writing engaging content for your website.

1. Picture Web Readers as Wild Animals

   In the article Information Foraging: Why Google Makes People Leave Your Site Faster, Jakob Nielsen at the Nielsen Norman Group likens readers to 'wild animals gathering food' who are looking for the 'maximum benefit for minimum effort' while searching the Web for information.

   Jacob describes the term 'Information Foraging' as the process of hunting for information and 'Information Scent' as the process of tracking or following the trail to the information they are hunting for.

   By considering this analogy, writing with the informavore's navigation behaviour in mind, you will improve the chances of catching the reader.

   
   

2. Spend Time on the Headline

   The headline is the most important part of the article.

   Authors tend to focus more on the body of the article, putting a simple headline or title at the top. However, for the reader, the headline is their first sniff of the information scent.

   Typically on the web links to articles are the headline, which the reader uses to determine the relevance to their search for information.

   Headlines must inform the reader of the subject of the article, arouse their curiosity, encourage them to continue reading and be short and memorable, all in one line.

   While there is no perfect formula, there is evidence that six worded headlines have been found to be the most effective.

   
   

3. Use Simple Language

   Writing for the Internet is very similar to writing for a newspaper or a magazine. The use of abstruse (hard to understand) words that are not part of everyday language will distract the reader (as just demonstrated).

   Even if you include hyperlinks to the definition of words that you have used, the simple act of wondering what a particular word or sentence means can distract the reader and break the flow of their reading.

   Unless your audience are academics looking for peer-reviewed journals, your readers will quickly lose interest and find something easier to read.

   
   

4. Follow the Inverted Pyramid Style of Writing

   A popular technique among journalists is the inverted pyramid writing style - putting the most important information at the top of the article and expanding upon the idea as you move down.

   Try to imagine your average reader as someone who is late for work in the morning, but really wants to know what is in your article, and write your copy accordingly.

   Include the most important information in your opening paragraphs instead of having the reader go through an entire page.

   
   

5. Pick Your Key Words

   Writing for the Internet is not just about writing interesting copy. You must also make sure that your content is search engine friendly.

   As an author, you need to consider the keywords of the topic you are writing about, and incorporate them into your writing to give your content the greatest visibility on the web.

   Some forethought is important however, as some search engines penalise the misuse of keywords, such as using unqualified or unrelated keywords, or using them too frequently.

   
   

6. Write for Easy Flow Reading

   Write content that can be skimmed through quickly whilst still delivering the important details easily.

   Readers want the answer to their question immediately, so give it to them and make it clear, but reward those that take the time to read deeper by expanding upon what the reader would otherwise take away just from skim-reading.

   Stick to a single idea per paragraph or use bullet points to separate out the ideas in long paragraphs.

   
   

7. Write Accurate Information

   One of the most important aims for any author must be the use of accurate information.

   Don't underestimate the ability of your readers to independently verify claims made by you in your article. Only provide them with well researched and factual content.

   If you learn that information in an old article has become incorrect, add a correction into the article or write a new article with up-to-date information.

   
   

8. Make Sharing the Article Easy

   While following the steps above will make a tasty article for the 'informavore', making the article easy to share will add the cherry on top.

   Add tools to allow readers to easily quote paragraphs of text from your article and post to their social media platform of choice. Provide the means for the reader to easily create a link to your article, or e-Mail the link to a friend.

   
   

In Summary

While writing for the web might be different from writing a book, or an essay; with continuous practice, authoring web content can become as easy as catching fish in a tank.

Keep the above points in mind when writing your next article and you are on your way to creating quality content for your website.

Further Information:

• The optimal length for social media updates and more
• Information Foraging: Why Google Makes People Leave Your Site Faster

Got Your Own Writing Tips? Share them with us on the iASP Central Facebook Page, or Get in Touch.

It seems like only yesterday the "experts" were advising that to achieve the best search engine performance you needed a properly optimised website layout along with the use of hand-picked keywords in the important areas of the pages.

The way Google ranks search results has changed the SEO game dramatically, however, and the tactics and strategies for Search Engine Optimisation have shifted to be almost totally content focused.

It would seem content marketing has replaced "traditional" methods of search engine optimisation (SEO), so we ask, how relevant are these   traditional SEO practices and is there any use in still following them?

Let's begin with a quick look at the history of traditional SEO.

Traditional SEO

Keywords and inbound links are the two broad philosophies directing the SEO industry. The goal: to have your website at the top of the results pages whenever a specific keyword is typed into a search engine.

This gave rise to strategies that aimed to deceive search engines using techniques such as "keyword stuffing" (using keywords or phrases numerous times on a page without any context or providing meaningful content for the reader), creating link farms and other practices that took advantage of the simplicity of search indexing algorithms to gain a higher ranking.

Legitimate websites found it difficult to rank highly in Search Engine Results Pages against these tactics, and it ultimately led to search engines changing the way they index and rank websites to ensure that the end user was being given high quality search results that gave them the information they were searching for.

New Age SEO

In response to deceitful SEO tactics, Google introduced a new algorithm that uses latent semantic indexing, which follows the idea that words used in the same context tend to have similar meanings. For example, the phrase "complete guide" is given the same ranking as "definitive guide" when either phrase is used in a search query.

Suddenly, the websites that had a stronghold on certain keywords and key phrases, and that were reliant on being at the top by pushing the competition out of the circle, found themselves now having to compete with websites using similar phrases. The distinguishing factor was now the content that was being provided to the user, not just the keywords in the search query.

Enter Content marketing. Content marketing, which involves the creation of high quality content to get ahead in website rankings is being touted as the new SEO.

Content marketing strategy also provides a greater return on investment by boosting a website's ranking through content being shared on a variety of social networking platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and others.

A case study by Kissmetrics, presented by Neil Patel, studied the number of visits and back-links to 47 info-graphics which cost $28,200 to produce. These info-graphics received 2,512,596 page views and 41,142 back-links from 3741 unique domains. The social media contributions were 41359 tweets and 20,859 likes.

Patel estimates that the costs of trying to manipulate Google by buying Tweets, Likes, visitors and links would be $1,072,905.80 as compared to the $28,200 spent on producing the infographics. 

That is quite a difference.

Apart from the cost factor, another major advantage for content marketing as an SEO strategy is the fact that good quality content will remain unaffected by future changes that search engines might make to their algorithms.

The Conclusion

The positive practices of traditional SEO that helped search engines to deliver high quality search results to their users have remained a part of the New Age SEO practices, while the practices that worked against helping search engines have been dropped.

The answer to our question - how relevant are the traditional SEO practices today and is there any use in still following them? - is that since the positive traditional practices are part of the new age practices, it is worth focusing on a content marketing strategy to provide and boost SEO rather than trying to implement and manage two strategies in parallel.

As Aaron Agius from Louder Online told Huffington Post recently, "Content is the foundation of any successful online marketing campaign. A great strategy is needed in order to fuel social media activity, to create high converting landing pages for pay per click marketing and to power increases in search engine rankings for target keywords."

Further Reading:

• How Content Marketing Is Replacing Traditional SEO Tactics
• How Google Is Killing Traditional SEO (And Why We Should Be Grateful)
• 7 Obsolete SEO Tactics You're Wasting Your Time On

What is your current SEO strategy? Have you shifted your focus, or are you still following the same practices? Let us know on the iASP Central Facebook Page, or Get in Touch.

5 Content Marketing Fundamentals

A well planned and executed content marketing strategy is no longer optional in order to stand out in the crowded digital landscape.

Content marketing is now a mandatory component of any Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) strategy and a powerful way to give your audience a great experience of your brand.

Content marketing helps attract new visitors and build a loyal audience, which generally leads to increased conversions. Content marketing as defined by the Content Marketing Association is the discipline of creating quality branded editorial content across all media channels and platforms to deliver engaging relationships, consumer value and measurable success for brands.

For most of small businesses, all media channels and platforms typically means a corporate website, some Social Media engagement and hopefully some level of pro-active marketing in the form of promotional e-mail campaigns or other digital or traditional media advertising.

To point you in the right direction, we've listed 5 Content Marketing Fundamentals to help you plan and develop a content strategy that delivers on your investment.

1. Plan: Know your Audience and Objectives

Before you start chalk out a plan.

You may not have all the questions to begin with, let alone the answers, but beginning with why, who, when and how is a good place to start.

Who are you talking to and what areas of your business is of interest to them? How will you communicate and engage your audience?

Remember - it's all about building a community interacting with your brand!

2. Be Prepared to Spend

Ongoing creation of high quality content is neither easy nor cheap.

As a professional in your industry you are well placed to set the content agenda, but if you're talents (and time availability) don't allow you to be hands on in the entire process you might consider outsourcing as an option.

Here at Hub Com Digital, our management team develops an editorial calendar containing the topics we want to focus on for the coming weeks.

We then internally work up an overview for each individual content piece.

In the case of an article that will be published on our company Blog as well as our Social Media platforms, we would first develop the overall premise of the article and give it a working title. We then attach a couple of suggestions for a headline and send all that information to our graphic designer to create a suitable image for the article.

The articles themselves are either entirely written by our internal staff, or outsourced to external professional content developers, who write the actual article based on the premise / title and headline suggestions we provide.

3. Content for Brand Building

Gaining respect for your brand is not easy. It's the outcome of a process containing many steps over time.

Relating information about the evolution of your brand and your journey to the present gives credibility and builds empathy.

When planning your content marketing strategy, be sure to include reference to your origins, what motivates you to succeed and what motivates your customers to keep coming back.

The aim here is to create personal connections with your audience and reinforce what your brand represents.

According to Robert Rose, Chief Strategist at the Content Marketing Institute, telling the story of your brand can be likened to conventional story telling at a level. In a post on CMI, Rose lists out ten steps divided into three broad categories which will help you understand how to create content that captivates and enthrals.

4. Content for Reputation

On-line reputation management, which involves the maintaining of your digital reputation as well as dealing with negative public feedback, has become a thriving business today. Many of us have Googled the names of companies along with keywords like 'negative', 'bad' to check the reputation of companies (and people) we are planning to deal with.

While most reputable organisations are unlikely to be subject to an attack like the infamous case where a large number of websites attached the keywords 'miserable failure' with a link to George W Bush's official biography page hosted by the White House, the reality is that social media networks have given customers a powerful platform and dealing with negative feedback - whether it is true or not - is an increasingly important part of modern business operations.

A pro-active content marketing strategy distributing positive content on-line is a powerful way to mitigate the damage of an attack. It also pays to have a solid policy for dealing with negative feedback in place. Refer to our Blog article: Five tactics to address negative customer feedback.

5. Content for Search Performance

Search Engines like Google are making it increasing difficult to manipulate their search rankings artificially. Google's documentation clearly states they reward "high-quality" sites, and by this they mean websites that give "great user experience" and "fulfill information needs".

Just as Google rewards "high-quality" sites, it penalises sites for "low-quality content". Before embarking on your content marketing journey have a look at this important article on building high quality websites in the Google Webmaster Central Blog.

Summary

A content marketing strategy requires a significant commitment of resources. The impact is not usually instant and mistakes can be very costly.

On the other hand, the long term benefits from building and nurturing a community centred on your business are coveted by many for good reason.

Want to discuss this some more? If you would like to know more about content marketing or about anything in this article please let us know on the iASP Central Facebook Page, or Get in Touch.

In a recent announcement on their Developers Blog, Facebook outlined a game-changing inclusion to their Platform Policy.

The new policy reads:

You must not incentivize people to use social plugins or to like a Page. This includes offering rewards, or gating apps or app content based on whether or not a person has liked a Page. It remains acceptable to incentivize people to login to your app, checkin at a place or enter a promotion on your app's Page. To ensure quality connections and help businesses reach the people who matter to them, we want people to like Pages because they want to connect and hear from the business, not because of artificial incentives. We believe this update will benefit people and advertisers alike.

You can view the full details here.

The policy change is aimed at curbing a practice known as Like-Gating - better known as "Like our page to get access to" or "Like our page to go in the draw" - which up until now, has proven to be an effective way to get a boost in page Likes in a short amount of time.

The new policy is also in line with Facebook's current promotions policy prohibiting the practice of sharing posts to gain entry to a competition or access to content.

Hub Com Digital Likes This

The new policy makes sense. It is to discourage the fake Like culture of Facebook and give more value to a single Like. As Facebook stated, the policy change has been made with the aim that people will Like a page because they actually Like the page (or page owner), giving a clearer indication of true followers rather than just a number of contest entries that haven't engaged with the page since.

It also means that companies will need to work harder to gain a Like by increasing their engagement, improving the quality of their content, and giving Facebook users a legitimate reason to Like their page.

The Like-Gate Alternative

The replacement strategy for Like-Gating is being referred to as Action-Gating - encouraging actions that generate true engagement from the user, such as providing some details or answering a survey in return for valuable content (or a competition entry).

This method is already a successful practice on websites, and it makes sense to use the same practice to generate leads on Facebook as well. The information that is collected this way is far more valuable than 1000 fake Likes on a Facebook page.

Further Reading:

• Facebook Bans Like-Gating: What Can Marketers Do?
• No More Facebook Like-Gating: What It Means and Why You Should Care
• Facebook is demolishing the like gate
• Facebook Shuts the Gate on Likes

What is your opinion about Like-Gating? Did you ever like-gate on your Facebook page? Or do you think the practice is right to be banned? Share your thoughts with us on the iASP Central Facebook Page, or Get in Touch.

So you have an awesome shipping policy and a killer returns policy ready to go, now it's time to move to the next area of eStore brilliance - On-line Promotions.

There are countless types of promotions...new stock arrivals, VIP benefits, seasonal clearances...promotions are an age-old tool designed to encourage customers to buy.

Promotions can be used to satisfy one of the fundamentals of great sales and marketing: fear of loss, which is arguably even more powerful and important in the fickle e-commerce world.

Great promotions are not just about discounts. Be creative. Promotions could be in the form of a bonus (free shipping), a "buy this get that" or a free sample. The key is to offer real value and incentive for customers to buy and to buy more and to buy NOW.

So, after much careful consideration, here's the 9 fantastic promotional tips that made the list.

HCD's Top 9 Tips for Fantastic On-line Promotions:

1. Have at least one promotion running at all times. The only time you shouldn't have a promotion, is when you have nothing to sell
2. Don't be predictable. Alternate the terms, length and other parameters to keep your customers guessing (and find what works best)
3. Repeat successful promotions regularly and ditch the less successful ones
4. Have at least one regular annual "Event", a promotion that customers can expect and anticipate. Make it HUGE
5. Spread your promotions across your entire product range and target all your customer demographics
6. Target customers who have purchased products with special promotional incentives on related products
7. Align your physical store promotions with your on-line promotions
8. Be aware of your competitors promotional activities and where possible out promote them or meet them head on
9. Include post-sale promotions within orders shipped to customers. A thank you letter with a unique promotion code is a proven sales champion

Join the Conversation - Do you agree with our top 9? Perhaps you have your own tips for on-line promotions that you would like to share? Leave us a comment on the iASP Central Facebook Page, or Get in Touch.

On-line Resources:

• 9 Tips from Borrell on Dominating Online Promotions
• How to Promote a Product Online
• 21 Ways to Promote Your Site Online and Off
• 5 Tips for Running a Successful Online Promotion

The #1 reason* that in-store-only shoppers refuse to buy online is the Returns Process.

If you think that's a powerful statistic, consider this: 89% of customers say they'll shop again at a store after a positive returns experience*.

We recently looked at how shipping policies can be used to improve online sales performance and customer satisfaction in our article 4 Awesome Shipping Tactics. Here we re-visit the randomly selected websites analysed in that article to look at their returns policies.

All policies we reviewed specify that items must be returned in perfect / as new condition, with tags, and in the original packaging; unless mentioned otherwise.

Target customers can return online purchases in-store, or by post, within 28 days of purchase. Returns by post require a returns form to be downloaded, completed and included with the item in a parcel. Target include an eParcel slip with orders which the customer can take to any Australia Post office. It isn't clear, but it appears Target pay the fee associated with returning the item unless they need to send it back again.

HCD Note: Allowing up to 28 days to return an item, and providing an eParcel slip with their orders to allow for easy returns is great, but their returns policy itself still left us puzzled.

Myer recommends customers use the FREE option of in-store returns. If the customer chooses to return the item by post, they must contact Myer for returns details. The customer must cover the cost of postage, and returns must be made within 30 days of purchase.

HCD Note: Myer, did you know the #1 reason in-store-only shoppers refuse to shop online is the returns process? Now you do!. 

The Iconic allows returns within 100 days of purchase, and customers can print off a shipping label for the package. The Iconic pays for the cost of returning the item, plus, customers can choose to receive a refund, an exchange, or 110%(!!!) store credit(!!!).

HCD Note: If you couldn't tell by the (!!!), again we are impressed with The Iconic eStore. Full marks, plus 10 bonus points for a cleverly structured policy page in the form of an FAQ. If this policy doesn't make a customer happy, they never will be.

That Online Shop allow returns within 14 days of purchase. The customer must contact That Online Shop to receive a returns form and instructions.

HCD Note: A stock standard returns policy. We get the no-capitals style the website is going for, but it does make reading the returns policy difficult. Compare this to The Iconic and think which is more likely to capture that 89% of return business following a "positive" returns experience.

PS: Sad to see the shopping cart layout is still broken on That Online Shop. We did contact them last week in case they weren't aware. No thanks was necessary - or forthcoming!

Oxfam Shop clearly states that return postage is free within Australia, and items can be returned 35 days after purchase. There are some items that cannot be returned however, such as food items.

HCD Note: Perfect! Very clear and simply written policy. More than enough time to receive, try and decide to return an item, and free return postage. Items that can't be returned are clearly listed.

The T2 Tea returns policy is a little unclear. The website allows returns to be made within 30 days of purchase, but it is unclear whether the customer can just send the item back, or if they need to contact the website first.

HCD Note: Probably the worst example we reviewed, not only is the returns policy a small paragraph at the bottom of the Terms page, it provides no information other than they will meet their legal obligations. We recommend doing the opposite of this example.

The Results:  The only common trait in the returns policies of the reviewed websites, is that items must be returned in near-new condition, unused and with the original packaging. Beyond that, the policies are very varied. All meet their state and national legal obligations, and it is about 50-50 in regards to whether the store covers the costs of returning the item, or whether the customer does. Even the time period to return an item varies widely between 14 days and 100 days.

HCD Tactics: Be reasonable, and realistic, with the aim of making the majority of returns a positive, hassle-free experience for the customer. Conversion is the main goal, so if your competitors are offering free returns, then you should too, or reduce the costs as much as possible. Make your returns policy clear and concise, and make the returns process as convenient as possible for the customer. Provide a returns label if possible. Lastly, look for ways to eliminate the need for returns through the store-front, by providing more than enough information about the product that the customer will need, such as sizing charts, extra-large images, product reviews and demonstration videos.

For more information about returns policies, we recommend the following reading:

• 4 Things Shoppers Want in an Online Retailer's Return Policy
• Handling online returns: 14 best practice tips
• Multichannel retailers need to work on their returns policies

* Statistics from Entrepreneur's infographic What Consumers Want from Returns and Why it Matters.

With 59%* of shoppers saying they consider shipping costs when purchasing on-line, and 44%* abandoning their cart due to high shipping costs, determining what to charge for delivery just might be the second most important decision that an eStore will ever make (after deciding to launch in the first place).

Here's our 4 awesome shipping tactics:

1. Keep it Simple: Flat fees are best
2. Offer Incentives: Offering free or discounted shipping based on minimum order totals is a proven tactic
3. Be competitive: Know your opposition and respect your customers - they'll know if you're gouging them
4. Use a disclaimer: Reserve the right to re-negotiate shipping costs post-order if necessary

We all know it ACTUALLY COSTS money to ship orders, but with customers voting with their wallets, what is the Goldilocks amount to charge for delivery?

To help you decide, we reviewed some Australian eStores to see what they are doing... (Note: HCD has no affiliation with any of the businesses reviewed. We have chosen websites randomly. All amounts are in Australian Dollars).

Target charges $9.00 for delivery of small orders under $75.00, or free shipping for small orders over $75.00. Their delivery charge for large items is $15.00, or $30.00 for 3 or more large items. Target also offer a "Click and Collect" option, which allows the customer to pick up their order from selected Target stores depending on the items in the order. This option is free for orders over $40.00 or $5.00 for orders under $40.00. 

HCD Note:A $5.00 administration fee to collect a pre-paid order in-store...really?

Myer offers standard delivery for $9.95 for orders under $100, and free delivery on orders $100 and over, except for Goods that require Special Delivery. There is also the option to pick up the order from selected Myer stores dependant upon the items in the order, which doesn't have an additional fee.

HCD Note: 5 Stars from us Myer - Target take notice!

The Iconic offers a few choices. Customers can pick up their order from a Parcel Point for free, which is useful if you are living in a major city. Otherwise, the cost for shipping by Australia Post is $7.95 anywhere in Australia. Free overnight shipping is available for orders over $50.00. For an extra $2.00, delivery is available within 3 hours to metro areas in Sydney or Melbourne.

HCD Note: We love the express options and with a low $50.00 threshold for free delivery, this is about as good as it gets.

That Online Shop offer free delivery for orders over $100.00, otherwise they charge $7.00 per item for standard delivery or $15.00 flat for express delivery. They also provide free gift wrapping with a gift tag. The terms specify that a surcharge may apply if delivery is to a non metropolitan postcode and the item is bulky or fragile, dependant on the excess charges applied by the courier. Delivery is available to international addresses at the rate of $40.00 to NZ, USA, UK or Asia, unless the items are over 2kg, where shipping costs are negotiated personally with the customer.

HCD Note: Full marks for the free gift wrapping and gift tag, and the incentive to make a minimum $100.00 purchase or select express shipping is commendable. Alas, $40.00 for international shipping for orders less than 2Kg may discourage many overseas customers from purchasing, and, as there are no weights included with any product details, customers have no way of knowing whether or not they have exceeded the 2Kg limit.
Sadly, we experienced technical problems on subsequent visits to this site, which we have pointed out to the website operators. This highlights the importance of technology that works.  

Oxfam Shop has a different approach to delivery fees. They have set shipping fees at 15% of the order total, limited to $7.00 minimum and $17.00 maximum, or $25.00 for express delivery. They also specify that large items may incur a delivery surcharge. Oxfam offer international delivery too, which is 15% of the order total, set between $40.00 and $100.00.

HCD Note: At first glance we weren't sure about this approach, however, the actual delivery costs are reasonable. Our recommendations would be to offer free shipping once the order total exceeded a nominal amount.

The T2 Tea on-line store have set delivery fees to $10.00 flat rate for standard delivery, and $20.00 flat for express delivery. Orders over $60.00 are shipped free within Australia. International orders have a different set of fees which change dependant upon the order total.

HCD Note: Full marks - but remember - this website does not need to factor oversize or bulky orders, in which case, a disclaimer would be strongly recommended.

Summary
While there are variations, the current trend for delivery fees is a flat rate ranging between $10.00 and $20.00 with an offer of free shipping for more expensive orders of around $100.00.

Remember, customers shop around to get the lowest price possible, which includes the delivery fees. Customers will justify buying an item that is a few dollars more than on another website, if the total including shipping still ends up being cheaper. Having a flat fee also makes the process a lot easier. Customers know up front what they can expect the shipping costs to be.

HCD Tactic: Review the cost of sending an average order to each of the major cities in Australia through your preferred courier(s).

Set flat fees that cover most bases while remaining in line with your competitors. Aim for a delivery fee of $10.00 - $20.00 for orders within Australia and encourage customers to spend more by setting a free shipping threshold amount.

HCD Tactic: If you find you simply can't compete with shipping costs offered by your competitors, consider investigating out how they do it...do they have a better deal with a courier or lower cost packaging and warehousing costs?  

HCD Tactic: Where necessary, use a disclaimer to reserve the right to adjust shipping costs (after the original order is placed) for oversize or bulky orders, or orders being shipped to remote or otherwise difficult delivery areas.

HCD delivers enterprise e-commerce and mobile commerce solutions to customers serious about maximising return on investment. Our proprietary technology caters for just about any shipping configuration imaginable. For more information please contact us for a confidential discussion.

* Statistics from VoucherCloud's infographic Consumer Psychology and the E-Commerce Checkout.

In our recent article - Google Panda Goes Kung Fu On Your Website - we pointed out that Google is giving website owners a nudge to update and refresh their published content. With that in mind here's our top 3 hassle free tactics for keeping your content fresher for longer.

1: Regularly update the key message on your homepage.
It does not have to be a major re-write every time, but regularly (at least once a month) edit the primary message on your home page.
Remember, it's all about engagement, so consider including a topical or seasonal message of relevance to your audience. You might mention the season and how it relates to your business e.g. "Winter is a great time for one of our famous Irish Coffees sitting by the fire" or "With Easter fast approaching it's the perfect time to book our free vehicle safety check" or "Don't forget, your next BAS Statement is due on June 21^st".

HCD Tactic: If your website allows inclusion of some sort of main image such as a banner on your homepage it is highly recommended you invest in updating this image regularly - at least several times each year. If you have a scrolling banner function you will get away with the same images in rotation for longer, and you might further extend the shelf life by swapping around the default starting image and the rotation order of the images.

2: Should you include the Date Published / Updated in your website content?
When it comes to newspapers, topical content that was news yesterday is old news today. When it comes to some areas of corporate website content there's a longer shelf life - for example your "About Us" page might only change when you have staff or other significant organisational changes and your "Product Descriptions" may also remain relevant indefinitely. In these cases you should never include the date published. Alternatively, if you publish news or a blog and write regular articles (at least one per month), then you should always include the publish date. 

HCD Tactic: If you are not writing at least one news / blog article per month you should consider removing the news / blog altogether or at least removing the date published from articles (which is not ideal) - better still, increase the frequency you publish articles to at least one per month.

3: Recycle your content.
You can save time by publishing / archiving / re-publishing content. Be sure to give the content the once over before re-publishing to be certain it is still relevant and accurate. Re-writing the headline and the opening lines will be enough to attract a new audience.

HCD Tactic: Publishing a new image with recycled content is a great way to refresh it.

If you've got anything further to add we welcome your comments, or if you are struggling with your website content, HCD may be able to help. Please feel free to get in touch.

The big news in the Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) world is the recent release of Google Panda 4.0. If you're looking for this new app in your Google+ account, don't bother, Google Panda is one of Google's many algorithms that determine their search result rankings.

While done in the name of fairness, Panda 4.0, like many of Google's modifications, has resulted in wide-ranging change to positioning within Google search results. It even caught some of our clients in the net.

For the uninitiated, Google is now targeting websites publishing copied content or poor quality content more aggressively than ever. Panda 4.0 encourages publication of fresh, unique, user-friendly content.

The primary target: websites that 'scrape' content from other websites for publication on their own. 

This will challenge operators engaging in questionable content practices, however, it seems at the same time legitimate operators are also being penalised.

For example, consider accommodation portals such as Wotif and Expedia. Individual Accommodation providers using these platforms provide the content themselves, which in our experience is typically fed directly from their own website.

Should parties engaging in this type of practice be penalised by Google? Does Google expect the Accommodation provider to write a unique description for every Accommodation portal it advertises with?  

Only Google can answer these questions.

So what do the new changes mean for your website, and what can you do if you've been "hit"?

Google's own suggestion is "If you believe you've been impacted by this change you should evaluate all the content on your site and do your best to improve the overall quality of the pages on your domain. Removing low quality pages or moving them to a different domain could help your rankings for the higher quality content."

HCD Tactic: Go through your content and give it a good spring clean. Rewrite your old content, remove duplicate content, and add new content that brings life back to your website.

Considering that SEO tactics at the moment consider the entire user experience, such as website navigation and having an intuitive website structure, mobile optimisation, and user-friendly content and metadata, it might also be time for a redesign or rebuild of your website.

No doubt, Google is being inundated with enquiries from businesses and website owners who have been penalised over the last fortnight, asking why they have dropped down the search results and what they can do to fix it.

If you think your website has been penalised unfairly, you can contact Google and ask them to restore your rankings.

We've compiled 5 useful sources for more information about the latest Google Panda release, and advice about what you can do to recover:

1. Google Panda Update
2. Google Panda Tips
3. Google Panda Update Survival Guide
4. High Quality Web Sites - The New Google Ranking Factor
5. How to run blogs that inspire

The phrase e-Commerce was first coined in 1998, but by then conducting commerce on the Web was already well established.

HCD Trivia: In 1998 HCD's founding partners Chris and Tony were Directors in Canberra based Internet Service Provider ACTweb - which was acquired by WebOne, which was then acquired by IINET. The ACTweb domain name www.actweb.net still resolves to the IINET website..

As the Web turns 21 this year, while surprisingly some still consider it a new science, last year e-commerce in Australia grew to almost 40 Billion dollars. 

At HCD, we believe if you are involved in certain industries such as consumer based retail and if e-commerce is not a core part of your competitive strategy your mid to long term survival is in jeopardy.

Successful entry into e-Commerce can be daunting, but the rewards and potential returns are high.

We are proud of the fact that many HCD clients are using the technologies and strategies we provide to deliver a great online experience to their customers and grow their business, but it's also true to say that we see some businesses struggle with their approach to e-Commerce.

HCD Tactic: The same fundamentals of "real-world" retail apply online. You need to attract new customers, give them a great experience and incentive to return.

Leading online shopping cart provider #Shopify put together a list of advice and observations from successful online entrepreneurs. 

Here's our top 10 from that list:

1. Define your desired customers by what their interests are, what motivates them to purchase, what they like and who they want to be. If you design your storefront and products to meet all of their needs and stay true to that brand, your company will be the first thing they think of when they are ready to make a purchase. - Caydi and Alex Zerega, Fit Little Bride.
2. When engaging with customers, do things early on that don't scale. Write little personal notes on packages. Say hi to them on Twitter. Invite local customers to come check out your shop. - Bill Trammel, Catan Boards.
3. As a general rule, we only work with nice people. We try to treat our customers the way we want to be treated and make every interaction a positive one. - Mariquel Waingarten, Hickies.
4. It's not an essential key to a successful business but it does help that you are immersed in the lifestyle of it. - Steve Watts, Slyde Handboards.
5. Find a way to be genuine. There is so much noise out there and consumers are savvier than ever - you have to really believe in your product and have an honest commitment to your customers to find a message that resonates. - Kishore Hiranand, Lookmatic Eyeware.
6. If you try to make everything as perfect as you can it's really going to show in your end product. - Chris Tsang, Mindzai.
7. Make sure you have something awesome that your friends want. If your friends don't want it, then somebody else better want it, otherwise, it's not worth doing. - Mike Krilivsky, Rage On.
8. We have found that an online store is not so different from our physical boutiques and that there is now a blending of service. - Gail Elliott, Little Joe Women.
9. By using high-class photography, we are able to evoke the color and texture of our fudge so that we can invite online shoppers into our kitchen, the heart of our business. - Giancarlo Di Sotto, The Fudge House.
10. People hate to wait for their purchases and they want to know where their items are, all the time. Pay a little more for a good shipping partner, because it will pay off in the future. - Diogo Cruz, Vertty.

There's no solid formula for how often to send e-mail marketing campaigns, but here's our guide for optimum message frequency:

• e-Mail Daily
  
  Generally speaking a "marketing no no" unless of course your audience explicitly understands they are subscribing to "Daily Deals" or "Daily Tips" etc.
  
  
• e-Mail Weekly
  
  Weekly e-mail is great for promoting "weekly specials" from high volume retailers and "what's on" from hospitality providers.
  But remember - this is more than 50 direct intrusions into your subscribers lives each year so be very sure you have something new and worthwhile to say each time.
  
  
• e-Mail Monthly to Quarterly
  
  This is where most professional service providers, business to business providers and the majority of businesses should probably lie.
  Sending marketing messages with this lower frequency keeps your brand in your subscribers minds without over-stepping and should allow you enough time to generate content that sparks real interest from your audience.
  
  
• e-Mail Infrequently
  
  If you haven't got anything interesting to say - say nothing.
  Send marketing messages only when you've got something of real interest to pass on - a new product launch, a change of key staff, your Christmas trading...sending messages for the sake of sending messages is probably the worst thing you can do.
  
  
• Hub Communications Tactic
  
  You might consider allowing your Subscribers more control over the messages they receive by offering multiple "areas" or "topics of interest".
  Indicate how regularly messages relating to each area or topic are typically sent i.e. "weekly specials" or "monthly industry news" and let subscribers opt-in (and opt-out) as they wish.
  
  

In summary, every business is different, finding the right balance requires testing and measuring... but getting it right can be well worth the effort!

Last month we explained that half of all online customers had more confidence in products after watching a video, and a third bought the product after being influenced by the video. Pretty good reasons to incorporate video into your online shop!

Everyone with a Smartphone or Tablet has a video camera, but like all online content, if it isn't engaging it will just be ignored.

Here's our 4 essential tips to plan videos that will engage and inform your customers effectively...

1. Know your purpose - Why are you making this video? Are you showcasing your products? Providing instructions to help customers? Maybe something more creative?
2. Know your audience - Tailor your language and content to your audience. Will they understand technical terms? Do they expect/need to see a full product demonstration? Do they want to hear about the manufacturing process?
3. Where will you publish? - Youtube is King, but there are other video platforms. Will you publish your videos exclusively on your website? Will you broadcast over many different websites?
4. Measuring your Results - How will you measure success? The total number of views? How many times your video is shared? Sales generated by your video? What tools will you use?

Consider our 4 essentials when planning videos to enhance your online store...and who knows, you just might create the next viral video sensation!

(Image by NewsbiePix.)

A big part of our business is dedicated to helping our clients successfully engage in Social Media.

We see the positive effects every day, but Social Media is not for every business.

Here's our Social Media compatibility check-list:

• Audience:
  Does your product / service appeal to an audience that justifies the effort?
  If you supply specialised parts for an aircraft manufacturer chances are you won't appeal to a large enough audience to deliver return on investment and your efforts to engage customers could be better spent elsewhere.

• Shareability:
  Is your product / service something your audience will be happy to share with their friends?
  Treatments for certain diseases may not be something your customers are happy to tell the rest of the world they are using!

• Resources:
  Do you have the time, money and people with the knowledge and skills required to successfully engage in Social Media? If you don't have the people on staff, do you have the resources to out-source?
  Social Media requires a long term investment of time and money, but that's only part of the story.
  Social Media requires a team effort from all stakeholders in your business and demands a level of knowledge, certain skills and importantly the motivation to be successful.

If you're not sure whether or not Social Media is right for your business, here's my number 1 tactic: look at your competitors!

If your competitors are successfully growing communities and engaging their customers it means you can check off Audience and Shareability from the list, and this will probably provide you with all the motivation you need.

So it becomes a matter of Resources: Time, Money and People (either internal staff or out-sourced personnel).

More about this over coming weeks.

The most difficult part of any social media continuous marketing strategy is to generate meaningful content. It can be daunting, but a content calendar is a great way to start.

Choose topics relevant to your business and plan the days that you'll write about each topic. Schedule staff to contribute because, ultimately, their skills and relationships with clients comprise the knowledge and capabilities of your business. It's also great to periodically reference industry related news, but be sure that you choose reliable sources.

Remember that it's important to keep your company's voice consistent, so all content should pass through your Community Manager before it's shared with the world.

Our Best Mobile Strategy Tactic:

Here's a no-brainer starting point for your mobile strategy: Submit a Google Local Business Listing.

If you're not sure how, here's another pearler for you...Google it!

A huge percentage of mobile search is local...and a huge percentage of results lead to a direct visit...so claim your share now and stop giving up the high ground to the other guys.