In January of this year, Social Media Today published an article about why visual search will be one of the biggest digital marketing trends of 2019. They described visual search as having the potential to revolutionize how consumers find and buy products moving closer to offering instant gratification demanded by today’s customers.  

Facebook Live is relatively new as it has only been around since 2015, but has recently become one of the best ways to engage with clients and a target audience. There are many ways to utilize this amazing marketing tool. You can encourage people to get involved in the community and come together, show them how to do something, offer clients a questions and answers session, give the audience a unique perspective behind the scenes and create an engaging series.

When you hear artificial intelligence marketing, you may think that is something for large companies with big budgets or some kind of term used in the movies, but it’s really something every business owner can utilize. Think about your daily life, we benefit from artificial intelligence every day—Amazon and Netflix use artificial intelligence to recommend products or television shows based on what we search or watch.

Who is guilty of being sucked into someone’s story on social media? I’ll admit it…me! It never fails I’m just going to take a quick scroll through Facebook or Instagram and BAM the next thing I know; I’m engrossed in a story. There is something about quick little snippets that can hypnotize us, particularly for me, if it is someone or a business that is continually offering tips and advice on something I am interested in.

“Hey, Siri! Find nearby gas stations.” How many of you have asked Siri a similar question when you’re out and about? I bet a lot of you depend on Alexa and Google Home devices to help you accomplish many of your daily tasks from setting alarms to reminding you to pick up flowers at a nearby florist. Voice search is growing at a rapid pace and gaining ground on traditional search applications. According to a business study conducted by Bright Local in 2018, 58% of consumers have used voice search to find local business information in the prior 12 months and 46% of voice search users look for a local business on a daily basis. Did you hear that…local and daily! That’s you!

Back in 2015, Think with Google published an article about how micro-moments are changing consumer behavior forever. Maybe you have heard the term, maybe not, but I’m certain you’ve participated in a micro-moment or two or million. Google defines micro-moments as “moments when we turn to a device—often a smartphone—to take action on whatever we need or want right now.” In marketing terms, they are moments that allow you to target a consumer seeking quick, practically instantaneous, answers or solutions to their problems. Think of your business as being there in your consumer’s time of need. This can be a fantastic opportunity, if you are ready, willing and waiting.

Companies have been using media kits for decades…they just used to be in a cardboard folder and mailed or hand-delivered. Fortunately, now most are in PDF format and can simply be attached to an email or downloaded from your website.

A typical media kit should contain:

Google Analytics is one of the most insightful ways to see how people are using your site, but it is perhaps one of the most underused. This powerful tool not only allows you to gain important information about how your customers are viewing your website, how long they are staying on pages, how they are getting there, but it is incredibly useful for identifying problems that your users are encountering while they are using your site. Not identifying and correcting these problems leads to lost revenues. Some very important problems that Google Analytics can help you identify are site speed, sudden traffic drops and look for 404-page sessions. Let us take a quick look at them in detail: