Digital Marketing Essentials

DIGITAL MARKETING
FOR YOUR BUSINESS
The book ‘Digital Marketing for
your business’ brings you, without
hesitation, all the important
information about digital
advertising in 2020.
FRR DESIGN LTD | C.U.I. 13016152 | 71-75 Shelton Street, London, United Kingdom, WC2H 9JQ
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Digital advertising is the backbone of any successful business.
Entrepreneurs who do not invest in advertising on digital channels earn
less and have less potential for customer growth and revenue. If you want
to increase sales and the number of customers in your own business, it’s
time to learn all the important things about digital marketing.
If at the end of this e-book you still won’t be sure which marketing channel
and tactics are best for you - our team of professionals stand at your
disposal. All you need to do is send to us email to
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Contents
INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................................5
1. PRICING ..........................................................................................................................................6
1.1. Different pricing strategies .......................................................................................................6
1.2. Credit and payment terms ........................................................................................................8
1.3. Promotion channels .................................................................................................................9
1.4. How to distribute your products, B2B marketing .................................................................... 10
1.5. After sales service – handling complaints and returns............................................................. 10
2. MARKETING PLAN ......................................................................................................................... 12
2.1 Why have a marketing plan? ................................................................................................... 12
2.2 Essential components for a marketing plan ............................................................................. 12
2.3 Sample marketing plan ............................................................................................................ 14
3. BUSINESS IMAGE AND NETWORKING ............................................................................................ 17
3.1 Business image ........................................................................................................................ 17
3.2 Increase your visibility in your community ............................................................................... 17
3.3 Referrals................................................................................................................................. 18
3.4 Build a mailing list .................................................................................................................. 19
3.5 Business networking................................................................................................................ 19
4. BRAND NAME AND LOGO.............................................................................................................. 22
4.1 Brand identity ......................................................................................................................... 22
4.2 Differentiate............................................................................................................................ 23
4.3 Brand name and logo .............................................................................................................. 23
4.4 Building your brand personality ............................................................................................... 23
4.5 How?....................................................................................................................................... 24
4.6 Believe in your brand and your customers will too .................................................................. 24
5. YOUR WEBSITE .............................................................................................................................. 25
5.1. Why do you need a website? ................................................................................................ 25
5.2 Setting up a website ................................................................................................................ 25
5.3 Creating good content ............................................................................................................. 26
5.4 The copy ................................................................................................................................. 27
5.5 Search engine optimisation (SEO) ............................................................................................ 28
5.6 Website analytics .................................................................................................................... 29
5.7 Benefits of blogging................................................................................................................. 30
6. SOCIAL MEDIA AND ONLINE MARKETING ...................................................................................... 31
6.1 What is online marketing?....................................................................................................... 31
6.2 The power of social media ....................................................................................................... 31
6.3 Rules of engagement............................................................................................................... 32
6.4 Prepare a social media marketing plan .................................................................................... 32
6.5 Manage your online presence ................................................................................................. 32
6.6 How to be likeable on social media.......................................................................................... 33
6.7 A picture is worth a thousand words ....................................................................................... 33
6.8 Facebook................................................................................................................................. 34
6.9 LinkedIn .................................................................................................................................. 35
6.10 Google + Business.................................................................................................................. 37
6.11 Twitter .................................................................................................................................. 38
6.12 Blog ....................................................................................................................................... 38
6.13 YouTube ................................................................................................................................ 40
6.14. Pinterest .............................................................................................................................. 41
6.15. Skype ................................................................................................................................... 41
6.16. Email marketing.................................................................................................................. 42
7. PUBLIC RELATIONS AND ADVERTISING .......................................................................................... 43
7.1 Look for PR opportunities ........................................................................................................ 43
7.2 . Brainstorming ...................................................................................................................... 44
7.3 Writing an effective press release............................................................................................ 44
7.4 Radio/Press interview ............................................................................................................. 44
7.5. Generate newsworthy ideas ................................................................................................. 45
7.6 Advertising .............................................................................................................................. 45
8.SALES ............................................................................................................................................. 47
8.1 Sales campaigns ...................................................................................................................... 47
8.2 Your sales pitch ....................................................................................................................... 47
8.3 Lead generation ...................................................................................................................... 48
8.4 Pay per click advertising (PPC) and selling online ..................................................................... 49
CONCLUSION .................................................................................................................................... 50
INTRODUCTION
Digital marketing has taken everything down in recent years records when we talk in investments, in
a relationship in other ways promotion. Traditional forms of marketing (TV, magazines, radio, posters)
are slowly becoming a thing of the past, and in their place comes digital marketing.
Digital marketing is the promotion of activities belonging to a company or individual through digital
channels, such as social networks, websites, advertising services, etc. Although digital marketing has
been growing for many years, rapid growth began after 2010. Companies and brands have realized
how they can control much better what they invest their budgets in, through digital channels. This also
allows them to optimize ads with minimal investment where new clients are easily reached, and better
business results.
One of the main benefits of digital marketing is Ad optimization - targeting a specific group of people
and investing only in successful ads. For example, if you publish an ad in a newspaper, everyone will
see that ad - old and young, lovers of flowers and cars, people whom they like to spend time and who
hate to break away from the TV, etc. Through traditional forms of marketing, you can’t target a specific
group of people and know which ad brings the best results. With digital marketing, things are much
better precisely. When setting up ads, you can have your direct promotional activities exactly to that
group of people who are interested in your products or services. That’s a great thing because you’re
not wasting your budget in vain to people who aren’t interested in what anyway offer.
No more spending money on wine advertising to people who don’t drink alcohol, car advertising to
people who do not have a driver's license, advertising taxi service to people living in sparsely populated
areas places, etc. Digital marketing has brought a revolution to the world of marketing. Year after year,
digital marketing is collapsing old forms of marketing, so it has long since overtaken radio and
newspapers and is slowly surpassing investment in TV advertising. This is expected to happen in the
future be the primary (if not the only) advertising channel. For example, data show that in the U.S.,
traders in 2010, spent about $ 5 billion on digital marketing compared with 2019 where it amounts to
almost $ 28 billion.
The e-book in front of you will introduce you to the world of digital marketing. It will
teach you how to properly use different digital channels and thus achieve maximum
performance with minimal investment. Of course, this e-book is just an introduction
to digital marketing, but it will provide you to get acquainted with the basic concepts
and figure out which is the best channel for your marketing activities. Chapter by
chapter, we will introduce you to several key advertising channels through the
Internet. We will introduce you to pricing, and how to make a marketing plan, the
importance of social media, which features a particular network offers for
advertising, and we will give you advice on how to harness the potential of a
particular platform.
1. PRICING
1.1. Different pricing strategies

There are many types of pricing strategies. The choice of strategy will depend on the nature
of the service or product and the market its being introduced in.
The four main, traditional pricing strategies are:
 Premium Pricing is placing a high price on a product or service when compared to

similar competitors. It’s usually used in segments and industries where a particular
brand has a very strong identity and is distinctly unique. Because of the compelling
‘added value’ a strong brand offers, it can withstand a high price as consumers value
their identification with the brand, are willing to pay a premium price and remain loyal.
Premium prices are charged for luxury items like Ferrari cars, Tiffany rings, Rolex
watches and penthouse suites in hotels.
 Penetration pricing is used when a new product is launched in order to attract many
buyers. It’s lower that the eventual intended selling price for a certain promotional
period with the intention that people will buy because of the low price, like the product
and remain loyal once the promotional period ends. The promotional period lasts long
enough to gain a certain percentage of market share. Food producers often use this
strategy in supermarkets when introducing a new product.
 Economy pricing is also known as the no frills pricing strategy. As there is a very low
profit margin with these types of product, the “pile ‘em high and sell ‘em cheap!”
approach is used. Unlike premium priced products, little is spent on advertising and
promotion. Instead, marketers aim for a high turnover of sales. Low budget airlines use
this strategy.
 Skimming strategy is used, for example on a new gadget that’s the first of its kind. In
order to recoup outlay on research and development, a high price is charged. The
marketers know that as soon as competitors see it gaining market share, similar items
will be launched. While a product enjoys exclusivity it can withstand a high price and
drop to a lower price once competition demands it.
As the modern consumer economy grew and changed, pricing strategies became more
varied. Here are some more:
 Value pricing is similar to economy pricing. It’s used in a market where the economy
has slumped or there is widespread competition. Products or services are priced at a
level that make consumers feel they are getting extremely good value.
 Promotional pricing summer and winter sales are typical examples of promotional
pricing. The BOGOF, buy one, get one free is another example of this strategy which
also uses coupons, vouchers and discounts.
 Psychological pricingis based on an emotional rather than rational reaction of the
consumer. PPP, price point perspective is an example of psychological pricing. Many
stores price products at, for example, 9.99 instead of 10.00. Psychological
consumerism comes into play when a customer is unfamiliar with a product line and
picks a medium priced one, psychologically deciding it’s not too expensive or poor
quality. Marketers may price their goods based on this assumption.
 Geographical pricing The same product can cost a variety of prices in different
countries due to different local taxes, shipping costs or a restricted supply. Countries
use products like alcohol and tobacco to generate state revenue and can affect prices
significantly from country to country. Countries can legally limit the quantity of certain
products that can be imported, giving rarity value and increasing the price.
 Captive product pricingis used when a necessary complimentary product is needed
in order to use one previously bought, for example, you might find a really good price
on a printer and find that the ink needed costs a high price and doesn’t last long. This
is how the manufacturer makes profits.
 Optional product pricingis used to lure consumers to add on optional extras to their
purchases. An example of this strategy in action is the Starbucks chain. A basic coffee
might be good value. Where they add handsome margins are for all the added extras
like flavourings and blends. Airlines offer additional extras like limiting the weight of
luggage allowed and charging for extra and charging to book a window seat or for
priority boarding. Concert venues charge extra for VIP tickets which entitle the
consumer to extra advantages at the venue.
 Product bundle pricing– a supermarket might offer pasta and a sauce bundled
together for a special price. You could find a DVD rental being bundled with ice cream.
Marketers often use this pricing strategy to sell old stock or slow selling products.
1.2. Credit and payment terms
In a small, start up business, managing cash flow is absolutely crucial. Like the blood
flowing through your veins to keep you alive, money needs to flow freely through your
business. It goes without saying that more needs to come in than goes out. Extending
credit can be a big strain on your business, especially if it restricts your ability to expand,
market yourself or invest more.
If your business involves providing a one to one service to customers, like hair styling,
professional make up application, nail artistry, dog grooming or a one-to-one styling
consultation, it’s likely you’ll get paid for what you provide immediately which is ideal.
It’s best to have a clear policy of expecting payment in this way for the health of your
business.
If you set up a wedding planning or event planning business, or if you become a teacher
of crafts, you will need to negotiate payment terms before you agree your contracts. To
help protect yourself from late payment and non-payment, use the guidelines below
which are commonly used by businesses with regard to credit and payment terms.
1. Know who you’re dealing with.
You need to know as much as possible in advance that your customer is reliable,
trustworthy and can afford to pay you. To allow for possible action in the case of non
payment, ensure you have as much information as possible, for example:
 Business name and contact details – to whom and where you’ll send your invoice,
address, telephone no, email, fax no.
 Is it a sole trader, partnership or limited company?
 Which person(s) are authorised to make decisions on your project and make
payments?
 Research the business’ history. How long is it trading? Who are its customers, past or
present? Are there long term customers? Have there been any credit judgements
registered against this business? Any legal cases?
 Are there other business(es) that the individuals or directors are or have been involved
with? Check how reputable they are.
 Ask for two trade references and a bank reference and verify their validity.
 How willing is your customer to agree fair payment terms? (Consider your outlay to
suppliers in the interim.)
2. Be clear about agreed payment terms.
Once you’ve agreed payment terms with your customer, these should be written into
two copies of your contract and both copies signed by you and your client before you
begin any work or place any orders or bookings. If you have any staff working with you,
they should also be aware of these terms and not to agree to any request for changes.
3. Develop good habits with invoicing
For good credit management it’s essential to seek payment as soon as your service or
product is delivered, or as soon as you’ve agreed with your client that payment is due.
Send out your invoice promptly; the sooner you issue it, the sooner you’ll paid. Make
sure you include all details your customer needs about your company and the job done,
including dates. Be careful to get these right first time. Include VAT if applicable.
For ongoing customers, issue statements monthly, showing all transactions and any
outstanding invoice amounts.
4. Allow for uneven cash flow
If you work on long projects and have to wait until the end to get paid fully, you may
need to set up interim cash flow for working capital. An overdraft facility works well for
most small businesses. Another option is invoice discounting. You can approach your
bank, show them the agreed contract outlining what you’ll earn on completion and the
invoice for the full amount, even though you won’t be sending it out yet. They may
decide to advance you a percentage of what is owed to you.
5. Deal with non-payment early
It’s wise to have a good accounting system in place which will highlight immediately ay
outstanding payments. If a customer doesn’t pay on time, your money is being used
somewhere else instead of for your benefit. You need to be assertive in expecting
payment promptly. Keep an eye on any clients who consistently pay late. Think about
reviewing terms when working with them again. Legally, a late payment is liable for
interest charges. From your point of view, be efficient at paying your suppliers so you
maintain good relationships and can continue to rely on them.
1.3. Promotion channels
There are many ways you can promote your business and much you can do at little or
no cost. Below are the main channels businesses use. We will discuss them in more
detail later in this course.
 Visual promotion – signage, shop front.

 Advertising
 PR
 Networking
 Website
 Social media
1.4. How to distribute your products, B2B marketing
One of the ‘P’s in the traditional 4Ps marketing mix stands for ‘Place’; in other words,
where your products are sold. If you develop more products or services than you can
market and sell in your own premises, or if you believe you would sell more if you had
access to a bigger audience, you may need to create a distribution strategy. Getting
your products or services to your end user through the channel of another business or
businesses is called B2B marketing, Business to Business marketing. There are a
number of ways you can get your products or services to a wider market.
Retail outlets
You could negotiate with a retail outlet or chain of stores to have your products stocked
by them. You’ll benefit from the outlets exposure and promotion which, if the ‘place’ is
right for your product, may increase your volume of sales significantly. The retailer will
take a percentage of your selling price.
Distributors
You may reach an even wider audience by setting up a distribution channel with a
distributor that specialises in your sector. Your product can quickly and efficiently be
delivered to a wider range of outlets than a single retail chain. Check trade magazines
and organisations for suitable and reliable distributors.
Online
Online shopping is continuing to strengthen and grow, both for products and services.
If you intend to sell your products from your own website you’ll need an ecommerce
function with secure payment and information management facility. You can also
explore relationships with other websites that already have a large following who could
sell your products. You’ll benefit from a larger level of exposure to your market and the
percentage you’ll forego to the host may be worth it if it increases sales significantly.
1.5. After sales service – handling complaints and returns
Though you may do everything you can to keep every customer satisfied, inevitably
you will need to deal an unhappy or complaining one at some point. As 80% of unhappy
customers don’t complain, they just take their business elsewhere and you won’t know
why, see the ones who complain as a positive learning experience for your business
and use it to iron out problems and offer an even better service.
If handled well, an unhappy customer often becomes an advocate if his or her complaint
is dealt with courteously and with generosity. This outcome is in stark contrast to one
who might spread the word that you’re a bad business to deal with so it really is worth
spending time and effort sorting out complaints not just satisfactorily, but surprisingly
well. Customers move even when there’s no negative reason. Do what you can to give
exceptional service to lure your customers into long term loyalty.
It’s a good idea to for you and any staff to be prepared in advance for a possible
complaint. Here are a few guidelines:
 Have a policy on complaints or returns that everyone who may be approached knows
well. Part of that policy should be an acceptance of giving priority to complaints.
 Handling an unhappy customer can be stressful. There are lots of self development
books that teach skills in dealing with conflict calmly. Learn these skills and teach and
support your staff so they feel confident in the face of a complaining customer.
 Decide what authority any staff member has to resolve situations in advance of any
incidents. Be clear what steps can be taken.
 Analyse each complaint, see how to avoid similar and learn from it. Improve whatever
is needed to gives a good service without attracting any complaints. Retrain staff,
rethink processes and replace sub standard stock if necessary.
When dealing with a complaining customer face to face:
 Listen carefully to what the customer wants to tell you attentively and patiently. If she’s
very upset, this may help to calm her.
 When she has said everything on her mind, thank her for taking the time to let you
know, repeat what you’ve heard and ask any questions you want to get a fully clear
picture.
 Your goal is to resolve the situation, not to be defensive or allow it to escalate. Make
her feel you’re on her side and looking out for her interests.
 Apologise politely. Sincerity goes a long way here. You don’t need to blame anyone,
just show you mean it.
 Work with her to come to a satisfactory resolution. Jumping straight to offering a
voucher, discount or free service/product doesn’t always show you’re committed to
solving the problem that arose. Offer a couple of different solutions. Ask how she would
like it resolved.
 If possible, come to a resolution straight away.
Thank the complainer – she gave you the opportunity to fix something that could
improve your business and could turn her into a loyal customer who recommends you
to others.
Even though there are serial complainers, most of the time complaints are valid. Start
with that assumption. If you have staff, listen to their experiences with customers and
always be on the lookout for ways to improve and avoid complaints.
The internet has given a voice to everyone. One person can now reach millions in no
time. Businesses are under unprecedented scrutiny and need to pay attention to every
disgruntled customer with equal care, quickly. Complaints can come through email,
your website or social media and you need to respond immediately. Act like you’re
under a global spotlight with the opportunity to impress rather than be shamed. Turn
complaints around and make them positive PR exercises. Admit when you’re wrong
without defensiveness and make amends generously. The public see everything as it
is, so be open and gracious.
2. MARKETING PLAN
2.1 Why have a marketing plan?
It’s essential to have a marketing plan. Not having one is like trying to steer a car with
your windscreen obscured. Being guided by a well thought out one makes the road
ahead clear for not only you, but any staff, investors or partners you do business with.
Some of the benefits to a good marketing plan:
 Outlines definable, ambitious but achievable goals.

 Provides a clear working plan from month to month.
 Allows you to analyse performance, measure progress and redefine goals and targets
as you see the results of the implementation of marketing strategies.
 Gives you an objective critique of your business, yearly or twice yearly.
2.2 Essential components for a marketing plan
Below is a list of all the essential categories to include in comprehensive marketing plan. In
section 2.3 you’ll see a sample marketing plan for a start up Make Up artist’s business.
1. Target customers
To complete this section usefully, you’ll need to refer to your market research. You need to be
clear exactly who you are trying to sell to and know that customer intimately. (Age, gender,
interests, lifestyle, needs, wants, etc). Having an accurate picture of your typical client helps
you focus your marketing actions and appeal directly to the most lucrative audience for you.
2. Difference
Also known as your USP, unique selling point, how you stand out from your competitors is
what gives you the edge when competing for customers in the same target audience. Why will
customers buy from you instead of your nearest rival?
3. Positioning and pricing
The level at which you pitch your service or product in your market will determine your pricing.
If you claim to be the best and then price yourself below your competitor, you lose credibility.
Your price should reflect the spending profile of your typical customer and what he would
expect to pay for the quality you offer.
4. Distribution plan
For a product or line of products, this is how you get your products to your customers. Will they
be for sale on your website? Will they be available in other retail outlets or through distributors?
If you’re offering a service, your main distribution channel with be direct from you to your
customer. It may also include a partner, for example, a dog groomer might work on a vet’s
premises once a week. A hair stylist might arrange to be in a beauty salon to offer hair washing
and styling after customers have a massage. Think through any other channels you’ve worked
out to get your services in front of your target audience.
5. Offers
In this section, detail any plans you have in the coming weeks/months to run any special offers
to attract new customers and further entice your existing clientele to do more business with
you, e.g. vouchers for a free service, a two for one deal, 20% off when booking three
appointments together etc. This is a good way to grow your customer base.
6. Marketing materials
Your marketing materials include all the methods you use to let your customers know about
you – your website, brochures, business cards, social media, and signage.
7. Promotions
Think ahead to the coming year and decide on a promotions strategy to boost sales at
opportune times. For example, as a wedding planner you might decide to attend three wedding
fairs in the autumn to take bookings for weddings in the following year. A dog groomer could
book a stand at an annual dog show in the area. Include any plans for press releases, online
campaigns, competitions etc.
8. Online marketing strategy
Outline your plans to improve Keyword optimisation, SEO, use of all social media platforms
that suit your audience and whether you have planned any online advertising.
9. Lead conversion strategy
This is the marketing term for the methods you employ to turn prospective customers into
paying customers. List all your methods here, for example:
 Having enough compelling content on your website to convince visitors to purchase or

book (use analytics to measure what percentage of visitors converts to a customer).
 Training yourself and your staff in excellent sales techniques.
 Designing an offer that makes your service irresistible.
 Planning a referrals reward system. For every customer referred, a regular customer
gets a discount on next booking.
 Target your promotions and offers to customers who are likely to want and willingly pay
for what you’re offering. You’re wasting resources if you chase the wrong type of
customer.
10. Increasing price strategy
Though customers can be very sensitive to any price increases, a small increase on all your
sales can make a big difference to your bottom line. Another way to increase income and offset
customer sensitivity is to add value to an existing offer by bundlingproducts. You could also
have a premium version of a popular product for which you can charge extra.
11. Retention strategy
Your retention strategy outlines how you propose to keep the customers you already have.
Include your monthly newsletters, competitions, reward/loyalty programme etc. It can often be
more productive to encourage existing loyal customers to buy more from you or buy more often
that putting a lot of effort into attracting new clients.
12. Financial projections
Your financial projection needs to include all costs of implementing the marketing actions
planned in your marketing plan and what you expected to yield in sales, profits and customer
numbers. Also include the extra revenue yielded from retention strategies. Projection is
another way of setting goals and analysing your results will give you valuable insight for future
marketing plans.
13. Executive summary
Here, summarise what’s contained in all sections so you can have an overview of your
marketing plan.
2.3 Sample marketing plan
To bring a marketing plan to life, the following is a sample marketing plan for a small business
called Beautify Me, owned and run by a professional makeup artist, Sarah.
Sarah has decided to concentrate her business on offering professional make up to brides and
wedding parties. She also offers a service to girls in their late teens and twenties for evening
occasions. As a result of dealing with her regular clients, she gains extrabusiness from other
members of the wedding parties like professional women who occasionally want their
presentation to be flawless.
Sarah has promoted her point of difference, her USP, as offering a Colorimetry service for all
new clients and an update session for existing clients who have changed personal colouring
due to hair shade or tan. A Colorimetry service uses the full spectrum colour wheel and a large
variety of different colour scarves to determine what colours and shades of colour suit each
individual based on skin tone, eye colour and hair colour and, to a lesser extent, hair style.
This is a complimentary session, given when an appointment for a full facial make up is
booked.
Choosing this service as a point of difference has many advantages for Sarah and Beautify
Me:
 It helps her stand out from other make up services in her area who don’t offer this
service.
 Having this extra skill shows commitment to ongoing improvement of her abilities and
her business which boosts her professionalism and capability.
 It shows Sarah’s interest in providing the best possible service for her clients.
 Clients are given individual focus and attention and feel her full interest in their features
and in their personal preferences, increasing potential loyalty.
 It gives the opportunity to develop a personal relationship with clients – essential these
days in building a loyal fan base.
 Knowing Sarah puts this much effort into getting make up perfect for each individual
strengthens her appeal to clients.
 People love getting something free – it greatly increases their willingness to pay for her
services repeatedly.
 These sessions, as well as her makeup sessions, give Sarah plenty visual marketing
material - before and after pics, fun experimental pics or video clips of her doing her
job – which she posts on her website, Pinterest, Vine and Facebook.
Beautify me - 6 months marketing plan

1. Target  Predominantly female, 17-30 years old. Typical customer puts a lot of focus on style and
customers image, keeps up to date with latest fashions in clothing but also in interiors, decor and general
lifestyle trends. Likes glossy magazines, online feautures and TV shows that feauture popular
icons and celebrities.*
 Tends to exercise regularly to stay in shape.
 Varied income bracket. Prepared to spend significant propotion of disposable income on
products, tools and services to maintain image. Will pay extra for quality outcomes
 (*Even customers who normally may not focus on image, once approaching their own
wedding, often adopt this profile.)
2. Difference Free Colometry service to all new clients.
3. Positioning and Luxury product, priced at a level that reflects a high quality product, but, given many of target
pricing audience will not be in a high income bracket, still relatively affordable.
4. Distribution Beautify Me premises. Once monthly stand up in upmarket department store.
5. Offers Once each quarter, voucher sent in monthly e-newsletter and in wedding magazine advert for
25% discount with booking for make up for a wedding party of 6 or more, when booked over a 4
week period.
6. Marketing Visually attractive shop front with tasteful, clear signage. Website + social media desgined with
materials help of visual communications designs. Leaflets for distributing at bridal fairs, local residents and
local businesses.
7. Promotions Attend for bridal fairs. At each, run a competition – each person who books appointment is
entered for a draw for free make up for the bride and groom on wedding day.
8. Online Spend one day with website developers to update keywords & improve SEO. Set up Facebook
marketing account to engange with audience. Renew pictures in website gallery.
strategy
Set up Beautify Me blog and post weekly.
9. Lead Use codes on vouchers to analyse whether website or magazine converted more customers.
conversion Study website analytics to learn from behaviour of visitors. Post make up video tutorial on
strategy website, focusing on one facial feauture. Compare analytics to measure improvement conversion
after free information offered. Ask all new clients, not just where they heard of Beautify Me, but
at what point they decided to make appointment to determine which marketing
material/actions/promotions/offers convince leads to convert.
10. Increasing For this period, no plans to increase prices,
price strategy
11. Retention  Announce new loyalty programme – to celebrate, first 50 appointments booked can enjoy
strategy 20% off following three appointments.
 Monthly newsletters announcing latest trend in colour palettes, feauturing new fashions, tips
on perfecting day to day make up, recoomendations on particular products
 In weekly blog, feauture 'looks' of popular celebrities, cool street fashion, free tips, etc.
12. Financial Projections
Month 1 Month 2 Month 3 Month 4 Month 5 Month 6

Revenue
Makeup for 1800 1800 2400 2400 3000 3600
Weddings
Special/Evening 3000 3000 3500 3500 4000 4500
Makeup
Total 4800 4800 5900 5900 7000 8100
Expenses
Operating Costs 1500 1500 2000 2000 2000 2000
Marketing 500 1000 10000 700 700 900
Total 2000 2500 3000 2700 2700 3100
Gross 2800 2300 2900 3200 4300 5000
PROFIT/LOSS
*Please note that the above financial projection is an example for a study purpose only.
Service Month 1 Month 2 Month 3 Month 4 Month 5 Month 6
Projection
Numer of 6 6 8 8 10 12
Weddings
Number of 60 60 70 70 80 80
single clients
13. Executive summary
This will be a busy marketing half year for Beautify Me.
 Focusing on our target audience of 17-30 year old females, we will continue to keep the
edge on competition and build loyalty with our free Colorimetry service to new clients.
 As our project income figures show, we plan to continue to increase revenue by
implementing new marketing strategies, e.g. including a discount voucher in the wedding
magazine ad and in monthly newsletters.
 We will increase our visibility in the wedding planning market by attending 4 bridal fairs and
predicat that with attractive marketing tools and our offer of discount from bookings through
fairs for a limitd time, further boost sales.
 We wil significantly grow our online presence and engagement with current and new
customers through setting a Facebook account and a Blog, by improving SEO and by
regularly adding attractive photos to our gallery. Finally, we expect the launch of our loyalty
programme to further strenghten repeat business from existing customers.
3. BUSINESS IMAGE AND NETWORKING
3.1 Business image

Most start up businesses run on a tight budget and can’t afford expensive marketing
consultants but there’s a lot you can do on a small budget to help market yourself. Some cost
free promotion can even be more effective than paid advertising and promotion. Here are a
few ideas.
Marketing your business is easier when you have a clear and consistent image – a clearly
defined visual brand. It’s a good idea to invest in good graphics for your business image. You
can use this everywhere your business communicates with your customers and potential
customers – on your website, facebook page and all online presence, on business cards,
stationery and, if you have a commercial premises, your signage and décor. You may be able
to find a student or newly qualified visual communication graduate to give you a good deal and
feature you on his/her own site – more exposure!
3.2 Increase your visibility in your community

Business networking is an excellent tool for promoting your business and we’ll talk about this
in more detail later. Personal networking is something you can do throughout every area of
your life. It starts with letting everyone in your circle of contacts know what you’re doing. Speak
about your new business with great enthusiasm and pick out elements of what you offer to
illustrate a benefit to people’s lives. The trick is to portray your idea in the best light you can
but not to be pushy which can turn people off. Let people know they will be very well looked
after if they come to you but don’t make them feel under pressure.
If your business is based in a local community, use opportunities to integrate with other
businesses and activities where people can get to know you and what you do. If you need
materials or supplies, source them locally and the suppliers you use will be happy to send
business your way. Give an informal talk in any club you’re a member of. Spread the word
among neighbours, sporting colleagues and your children’s school community. Always have
cards on you to hand out, showing your online addresses and the essence of your business.
Encourage everyone you can to visit your website and engage with your social media
presence. If your customer base is in your local area, when you build up a cash flow, sponsor
a local event. This can provide great exposure provided you’re not overshadowed by other
bigger sponsors and that you’re reaching an audience that suits your business.
3.3 Referrals
This is probably your most valuable form of marketing, firstly because referrals are cost free
and secondly because they are so powerful. A referral is when someone you know or an
existing client recommends your business to someone they know.
People place so much trust in a recommendation from someone they know that a very high
percentage translates into new business. If they’ve asked for a referral, they are already about
to buy, tend to look no further and come straight to you. This is a very valuable source of new
clients. It’s vital, then, that you consistently offer an excellent, professional product or service
to reinforce the high esteem you’ve been given. Always express your appreciation to those
who give you referrals. You can do so verbally or by offering discounts or small gifts.
Who can give you referrals?
 Friends and family. People who know and like them will also have faith in their
personal connections. Keep them up to date and aware of what you’re doing regularly.
 Existing clients are powerful advocates for your business. With loyal customers, keep
on your guard that you don’t allow familiarity to let your professionalism and standards
slip. If you do good work, they will be delighted to recommend you to others. Show your
appreciation when they do.
 Business colleagues. Your suppliers, services you use and any other business you
deal with, even occasionally, can pass the word around their business contacts about
you. If you, in turn, recommend their businesses the mutual benefit will encourage
ongoing referrals.
 Other small businesses. As we mentioned above, joining a business network
integrates you with many other small businesses. Members are happy to recommend
other members to their connections. If there are competitors in your network, don’t see
this as a threat but an opportunity. Even within the same service, there are specialities
which each one can target. There may be a way for you to collectively raise awareness
of your kind of business and increase the need. Business can fluctuate – at particularly
busy times they may pass extra work they can’t handle on to you.
 Links on your website. Having links to related businesses on your website and asking
them to link to yours grows your online profile and is another way of giving an
endorsement to your business.
 Positive comments on social networking business review sites can feed you new
clients. You have little control over these but can ask satisfied customers if they’d be
happy to post their experiences. Do your best to avoid anything that could inspire
someone to write a negative one. If it does happen, try to redeem your image as soon
as possible by giving such good service you can ask for three more excellent ones to
limit the damage!
To encourage referrals, don’t be shy to ask your existing clients to recommend you. If you do
a good job, they’ll be happy to. When people feel they get above average service or value,
they like to spread the news about their discovery.
3.4 Build a mailing list
Happy and regular customers will usually like hearing from you and being told about special
offers, recent or interesting news and seeing pictures of your work in action. Add to your email
list continually and send regular e-newsletters. Feature some success stories with your clients’
permission – this makes your business come alive and effectively builds credibility and trust.
Keep in touch reasonably regularly but not so often that you become a pest. Email newsletters
are commonly sent once a month or once a quarter.
3.5 Business networking

For start up businesses, the traditional tools of advertising and PR can be expensive. In most
cases they’re not interactive – they give a one way message from you to, hopefully, a relevant
target audience and you may not be able to measure the effectiveness and record tangible
results. The benefits of face to face networking are many. You form two way, mutually
beneficial, interactive and human relationships in a setting where everyone’s agenda is to help
grow theirs and their contacts’ businesses. It’s a very inexpensive way to promote and grow
your business.
Once you’ve set up your business, kick start trade by joining a business network or local
Chamber of Commerce. A network group is a small number of business people who work
collectively for the good of everyone in the group. They take any opportunities they can to
recommend you and you do the same for them. Many businesses thrive on these leads alone.
There’s probably a number of choices in your area and joining costs vary. Some are focused
on specific sectors; check whether they suit your business before joining.
There are professional networking organisations that charge a yearly fee and have focused
sales targets and expectations – as well as gaining from referrals to your business you’re
expected to drive a certain amount of business to your fellow members. Check all the terms
and conditions of joining before handing over a fee – they don’t suit everyone. Once you’ve
been in business for a while, you may decide to form your own network group with people who
can be of specific benefit to each other.
Preparation for networking
If you’re starting a one person business, it can be isolating spending a lot of time working on
your own. Many new entrepreneurs miss the interaction with colleagues. The challenge of
building credibility and a list of customers when you don’t have a track record can also be
daunting. Networking is a wonderful solution to these issues. It gives you the chance to engage
in a busy, focused environment, come across opportunities you might not otherwise be aware
of and promote your business to people who will not only do business with you but refer you
to their contact list.
Here are some tips on getting the most out of networking:
 Include in your business plan a commitment and regular time slots in your diary to
attend network meetings and events – weekly, if possible, in the early stages of your
business. Make sure you’re attending where it will benefit your business – check
membership or attendee lists and pick out who you’d like to meet or be introduced to.
 Fine tune your self-promotion skills. You’ll get better at this by putting it into action, but
before you start, prepare and practice your 20 second pitch and your 2 minute
presentation that concisely describes your business in a way that grabs your audience.
Instead of listing in general what your business does, it can have more impact to focus
on a particular product or service. Make it more about the benefit to your customer than
the fabulous features. For example, instead of saying “I use the latest equipment…” tell
them how much their lives will benefit from your service. “Your dog will be so clean and
shiny you can take him to bed with you.” Clearly differentiate your business from others
like yours and speak with enthusiasm, excitement and conviction. Be innovative in how
you come across and memorable in the right way. Mention real customers and
successful deals.
 Bring plenty good quality business cards/brochures. Don’t try to meet everyone and
spread them like confetti with little engagement; choose to people who you think might
be in a business/area useful to you and build a relationship. There will be other
meetings for more introductions.
 Networking comes naturally to some, others feel less confident. The more you practice,
the more comfortably you’ll present yourself. Push yourself beyond your comfort zone.
You have a lot to gain. Allow others to talk first; it gives you a chance to gather your
thoughts and pitch your business in a way that suits them.
 As well as expecting what you want to gain, be prepared to be helpful and generous; it
can only boost your reputation as a genuine, positive and proactive person to do
business with. Don’t see it only as a chance for a sales pitch. Give away free
information. Mention things you found helpful in setting up or running your business.
Refer other businesses you got a good service from. Your generosity will come back to
you.
 Be attentive every time you speak to someone. Put away your phone and focus politely.
Even if she may never use your business, she may know someone who will. Follow up
all your conversations with an email or phone call whenever you’ve made a
commitment, discussed a possible deal or promised anything, especially with a
valuable contact. Don’t wait for him to contact you, stay on his radar. This is really
important for your reputation. (But don’t be annoying or send repeated uninvited
communication.)
 Don’t be afraid to chat with competitors. You may be able to share useful tips or skills
and the chances are you’ll have a slightly different focus. You might market yourselves
together in a ‘go to’ area for your niche.
 Avoid spending much time talking about general weather/sporting/news topics. Make
your conversations useful and focused. If it’s clear the person you’re conversing with is
a time waster or won’t be of help, politely move on.
 Lastly, it’s an old but true saying – people do business with people they like. Be likeable!
Network meetings and events are generally supportive, productive environments that can be
a powerful launch pad for your business. Make full use of their benefits.
4. BRAND NAME AND LOGO
4.1 Brand identity

You could sum up what you’re marketing to your audience as your brand. Branding has
become a central part of marketing. You may think branding is more relevant to well known
products that reach a global market, to high profile individuals or to large companies but it
applies to all businesses, no matter how small.
Branding is the method of differentiating one product or service from another. The world today
is bombarded with choice. It’s also saturated with all forms of communication in a multitude of
forms trying to individualise messages which beckon the consumer to “choose me!” Clarity
about your brand identity comes from working out what is unique about your business and how
it stands out from your competitors.
Developing your brand identity will take time and careful thinking. One of the first
considerations is your customer. From your market research you’ll have a pretty good picture
of your target audience. You need to tease out the finer details of the interaction between your
business and your customer to figure out what will help you offer a unique benefit to her and
stand out.
The pace of life is very fast and people’s lives are busy. Be passionate about your brand and
create a compelling reason for people to choose your business. How can you make sure you
offer an irresistible package so your customers see you as the only solution to their needs and
wants?
 What are the unique benefits of your service/product to your customers?
 How will they feel after using your business?
 How will their lives change?
 Does choosing your business make their lives easier?
 Describe your typical customer. What lifestyle choices does she make?
 What other brands is she likely to be loyal to?
 How discerning is she?
 What motivates her choices?
 How would she prioritise price/service/efficiency/experience?
 Picture a 100% satisfied client – how would she describe her experience with you?
 How memorable are you?
 What personality traits does your business have? What qualities can your customers
expect to find every time they use your service?
 Every business needs to be reliable, efficient, trustworthy and honest. That’s a given.
What do you offer over and above these qualities that means you’re different?
The more you delve into the personality, qualities and attributes of your brand, the clearer you’ll
be in planning your marketing strategy.
4.2 Differentiate
To differentiate your business from your competition and market your uniqueness you’ll need
to know who your competitors are, direct and indirect. Emphasising your quality and excellent
service is necessary but not what will put you ahead of others who are claiming the same.
Competing just on price makes you very vulnerable – someone else can always undercut you.
What issues are important to your customers? What unique benefits do your competitors offer?
You need to come up with a benefit or benefits you offer that are unique to your business and
have these at the centre of your marketing strategy.
4.3 Brand name and logo

The visible representation of your brand will be your brand name and logo. It’s what will come
to mind when customers think of your business. It must clearly communicate what your
business is about – what you do, your values, qualities and personality. It must connect with
your audience both mentally and emotionally so you inspire customers to connect with you,
build a relationship and stay loyal.
As there’s so much involved in coming up with the right visual identity for every business, it’s
worth having your corporate image professionally designed. With the advances in the usability
of design software you might be tempted to try designing your own but, in the end it probably
won’t work. Graphic designers, or visual communicators, are trained in many aspects of this
art where everything you choose or don’t choose has a meaning – curves, shapes, colours,
fonts, size, images, tones, logo positioning and more. These all need to be taken into account
so you arrive at an identity that accurately represents everything that is the essence of your
business in the simplest, most unique and memorable way.
Before sitting down with your designer, spend time looking around at ideas you like in logos,
either within or outside your sector. You’ll narrow the parameters and help her/him to come to
a suitable choice more quickly.
When you think of the world’s leading brands in cars, beverages or sportswear, the first thing
that comes to mind is the logo. It’s why a t-shirt that costs 10.00 without a logo can be sold for
50.00 with the right one. A well designed logo will convey professionalism and instantly do the
job it’s meant to do. It should be clear, free of surrounding clutter and fully match and represent
what your company stands for. The better this match, the more consistent and powerful your
marketing will be.
4.4 Building your brand personality

The more intangible elements of a brand are its personality, qualities and attributes. The more
you convey these elements together with your visual identity, the more you infuse an emotional
connection with it. Your clients know what to expect from your business. A strong brand builds
trust, conveys consistency and reliability, is easy for consumers to do business with and stands
out. People who identify with a strong brand are more likely to develop a relationship with it
and stay loyal, meaning increased sales for you.
4.5 How?
The more you put into refining your brand the more easily you can identify your core message.
Get together with a few people who are creative, dynamic and proactive. Brainstorm on the
precise personality traits your business will have; for example if you’re setting up a business
as a professional make up artist, they may be sophisticated, current and creative. Next, decide
on the qualities you want to portray, for example, skilful, discerning, adaptable and fastidious.
Don’t use general words like reliable and trustworthy as they will apply to any business that’s
serious about being competitive and won’t distinguish you.
4.6 Believe in your brand and your customers will too

Once you’ve drawn a precise picture of the essence of your business, summarise what you do
in one to three short sentences and practice saying these out loud. It’s a really useful marketing
tool that gives you the opportunity to spread the word about what you do everywhere you go.
If you can come up with a good tag line for your business it can be a great help in bringing your
brand alive.
5. YOUR WEBSITE
5.1. Why do you need a website?

Today, a website is a must for all businesses, no matter what their size. Before customers
decide to come to you they are highly likely to have done online research, even those who got
a personal referral. Your website is your online shop window, your chance to look appealing,
be appealing and reassure the up-for-grabs customer that you will answer his needs better
than the competitors whose sites he will also check out. You can use it to show yourself off at
your best and build valuable credibility. If you don’t have a website you’ll look inadequate to
clients so it’s a necessary investment but probably not as costly as you think.
If you’ve grown up in the digital age, you’ll already have lots of ideas on creating an online
presence that accurately represents you and actively works to promote you. If you’re
uncomfortable or unfamiliar with anything digital, don’t be put off. You may feel it’s an alien
world you know little about but, far from being scary, it’s exciting, intriguing and can be a huge
asset to your business. Also, there’s a wealth of good quality information available online which
will educate you on everything you need to know about creating a website - what’s important,
what’s crucial, what to avoid and how to keep it working hard for you. Ask someone you know
who’s knowledgeable about website creation to get you started in the right direction. Next are
some basic guidelines but we recommend you add to these by spending time searching for
more detailed information online.
5.2 Setting up a website

Your website is catering to two audiences:
1. Your customers & potential customers and
2. The search engines, of which Google is persistently king.
You need to keep both happy and interested.
If you’re on a limited budget, you can design your own website, cost free. User friendly website
design tools you can learn to use like Wordpress, Wix, IMCreator and more have readymade
templates which you customise with your own content. Create.net offers a free 30 day trial and
a range of low cost monthly fees thereafter. Once the site goes live, in most cases you will
have to pay a yearly hosting fee but this is very affordable. Template master has a huge range
of templates from many DIY site builders.
It does take a fair amount of time to learn what you need to know, make all the technical and
design decisions and gather your content for a DIY site. You also need to educate yourself on
SEO – search engine optimisation - or how to appear high up in listings when someone
searches for you, your service or product.
Even though all you need to know is easily accessible online, it is a large amount of knowledge
to absorb. Before you start, talk to anyone you know who has set up a new website, ask for
recommendations and get some quotes from website designers. As your time is valuable, it
may save you more in the end to employ someone who knows exactly what they’re doing so
you can get on with other tasks and get this part of your business set up off the ground earlier.
Prices vary a lot bit if you just need a basic, informative site with up to 10 or so pages and not
a huge amount of content, it should be quite inexpensive. We encourage you to shop around.
As an example of what’s possible for a small budget, visit
http://www.toucher.co.uk/fixedprice_websites.htm or http://www.redevolution.com/website-
costs-explained/#.U2jaR5VOXmI if you’re in the UK. If you’re in the US, you’ll find good
information on costs here: http://www.executionists.com/blog/website-design/cost-to-build-
websites-2013/.
Whatever country you’re running your business in, search for sites like this to help you make
decisions.
Whichever route you take, you’ll firstly need to work out what objectives you need to achieve
with your site. Do you just want to raise awareness? Do you want to provide free information?
To provide information you want clients to know before they come to you? If you intend to sell
online you’ll need an e-commerce structure and a secure payment facility which is
technologically more sophisticated and more expensive, multiples of what a simple site would
cost. Shop around and ask around so you have a good knowledge of the market before you
make a decision.
5.3 Creating good content

Before you start to gather together the content for your site, define what your objectives are:
 To inform visitors?
 To selectively attract only a certain audience?
 To give free information?
 To show how inviting your premises is?
 To show your difference from competitors?
 To sell online?
Once you know what your aim is and who you care most about impressing, you can create
good quality information. A successful website is clear, concise, attractive, current and easy to
navigate. Visitors should immediately get a feel for what you’re about, quickly find what they’re
looking for and come away feeling like you’ve given a good service and answered their needs.
The bulk of the content on most sites is written material (copy) and pictures. (Unless its function
is purely to sell products.) You can add to these and bring the site alive by posting blogs,
videos, podcasts and vidcasts, though they may require more functionality and therefore
expense. There are tools you can use to post free blogs like Google blogger, Word press and
Type pad. Add further interest by linking your site to your chosen social media applications.
5.4 The copy
Producing good written content can be harder than you think. If you can afford it, hand it over
to a copywriter. They are skilled at using the right words, avoiding waffle and promoting the
best selling points of your business in a way that’s compelling. It will read well and look
professional. Another advantage is that most web designers will tell you that waiting for content
to be ready is the biggest reason for delay in getting a site up and running.
If you do want to give it a go yourself, here are a few tips:
 Even though you want to please both search engines and your customers, write with
your customers in mind. Search engines are becoming more and more insistent that
content is of a high standard, relevant to your site’s audience and answers what they’re
searching for.
 Keep it jargon free. Use simple, clear, plain talking language. You might love using all
the lingo exclusive to your sector but customers prefer to read descriptions and
explanations in plain language.
 Keep sentences and paragraphs short. Aim for sentences of no more than 10 words
and break up large blocks of text into smaller, individual paragraphs.
 Write like you’re taking to one person, your typical dream customer.
 Don’t write about the features of your business. Instead, emphasis the benefits. Try to
get your customer to feel how much better her life will be after using your service. E.g.,
instead of saying “We use the newest dog clippers available”, point out the benefit:
“Your house will stay clean longer with our summer close-cut using the newest
clippers.”
 Avoid starting sentences with “we” as much as possible. Instead, start with a verb. E.g.,
instead of “We can plan every aspect of your big day.” Write: “Relax and thoroughly
enjoy your most memorable day while we take care of all the arrangements.” As much
as possible, speak to your customer, not about yourself - use the second person
narrative.
 If you’ve prepared your content and end up with long pages of information, ask
someone outside your business to help you reduce it to what’s really needed. When
you’re too close to your subject it can be difficult to separate the pertinent points from
the unnecessary padding.
 Adding a frequently asked questions page is a really good way to avoid time spent on
repeated enquiries and search engines rate it well.
 Factually rich content appeals to both internet users and search engines. Try to keep
facts interesting, not too technical or industry specific. Think about what you write from
the reader’s perspective.
 As you’re preparing content, keep in mind that you need to regularly add new content
to keep it feeling fresh and the search engines ranking you well. Keep a note of ideas
you can add weekly. A blog is a great way to fulfil this function. If your business is very
visual, like make up or nail artistry, with customers’ permission, you can continually add
to your gallery of pics showing your work in action.
5.5 Search engine optimisation (SEO)
Once your site is ready to go live – your domain name is registered and you’ve arranged
hosting – your next task is to get it noticed. It’s rather like a catch 22 situation - in order to get
noticed by your customers, i.e. appear high up the list when people search for your type of
product/service in your area - you must first be noticed by the search engines. To be noticed
by search engines, one of the important criteria is to have lots of visits to your site. (Multiple
visits from the same IP address don’t count.)
You’ll need to spread the word to as many people as you can to visit and use all pages on your
site to build the traffic to it so you feature in results. Once you have a steady volume of users
and you update with relevant content regularly, you should be able to maintain good visibility.
If you’re a member of a networking group, ask everyone there to visit your site, linger on each
page and use all functionality.
More tips for helping your search ranking:
 If you’ve used web designers, they will help with the technical elements of SEO.
 One very useful tool you can also use to help is Google ‘places for business’. This
allows you to create a Google Local Business Listing, free of charge. It’s designed with
small businesses in mind and increases your visibility in local searches. Include
yourself in all business directory listings that feature in your searches.
 Emailed newsletters are a trusted way to entice people to visit your site. Before this
works for you, though you’ll need to build an email list of interested customers. Make
sure what you put in your newsletters is of interest or entertaining. Don’t let it be too
serious or need much concentration. Include offers and enticements, pictures and refer
to what’s relevant to your audience – either what’s happening in the world or in your
industry.
 If you have a site specific search box on your site, test its usability as these are known
to produce poor results. Pretend you’re a customer, type in a number of different things
you might want to find and see if you’re led to them. A well-functioning search box is
rated well.
 Link to other sites relevant to your business and ask them if they will link to yours. The
more prominent and used those sites, the more they will direct people to you. If you
write an informative piece that other sites find relevant, they can link directly to it.
 Keywords - as search engines respond to the kind of language the user uses, not
necessarily what you’d choose, make sure all your page titles, headings and copy
match this language. Before you finalise your copy, ask several people who might use
a service like yours what words they would use in a search. These should be included
as your keywords as often as feels natural through your copy. Don’t try to force too in
many and let the quality of your text suffer, this won’t help.
 Even though pictures matter a lot in making your site appealing to users, text still carries
more weight with search engines. Keep it of high quality.
 Information architecture, IA, is the term for having clearly organised, categorised
pages, with a clear purpose for each page and the content on each that serves that
purpose. Good IA helps with search indexing.
 If you’ve done your site yourself you’ll have learned how to edit your pages for updating
and for adding new content. If you’ve had it designed, you’ll need to be shown how to
use your Content Management System, CMS. Dedicate some time every week to
updating and adding content. If you’re consistent and persistent, it will pay off.
 Lastly, it can help your sites usability to have what’s called a ‘fat footer’. This means to
list links to your pages and to other sites in the footer at the end of your pages. The list
allows the user to click directly to what’s on the list. It can give a quick scan of the main
areas of your site that are searched for but don’t over stuff it!
5.6 Website analytics

Website analytics is the collection and measurement of data on internet sites and of
internet users behaviour so these can be analysed, understood and used by site
owners to provide the best possible service possible and to respond to continually
changing consumer behaviour.
Web analytics uses qualitative and quantitative information. It records and measures
traffic to your site and analyses a users behaviour once there – what pages are visited,
what is clicked on and which landing pages lead to purchases. It can also compare the
performance of your site against your direct competitors.
It gives you insight into how different marketing actions change the pattern of behaviour
of visitors. This means you can gauge what works and what doesn’t. You can
immediately adapt your strategies to better meet the demands of users. You can also
measure the performance of your site against key performance indicators.
As well as these functions, you can also use web analytics to measure off site traffic -
consumers behaviour in general - which gives you an understanding of your potential
audience on the internet and a tool to compete with your competitors.
Having access to this data is a very insightful and helpful tool. But it’s useless unless
you can use it. You may need someone experienced to help you learn how to
understand all the information and more importantly, how to use it to improve the
functionality and success of your site – how to entice customers and potential
customers to behave according to the objectives you’ve decided your site is designed
to achieve.
Which analytics tool to use?
1. Google Analytics is completely free and by far the most popular and most used
analytics tool. It’s simple to use and will give you all the basic information you need to
analyse your visitors. It will allow you to see where your site visitors are coming from,
how they behave while on your site and how often they visit.
2. Yahoo Web Analytics is also free and takes things a little further. It has the same
analytics functions as Google’s but also helps you dig a little deeper. You can do more
in-depth profiling of visitors and filter and customise in more ways.
3. There are smaller companies, like www.crazyegg.com that take analytics even
further. They use heat maps to measure user behaviour to an even finer degree. They
can help you not only to track visitors’ clicks but to pinpoint hotspots, see where they
stop scrolling and to identify different traffic types so you can then make changes to
optimise your users experience on your site.
5.7 Benefits of blogging
One of the most effective and beneficial things you

can do to improve your website’s performance, and
therefore your business, is blogging.
1. Unlike your website, which contains static, limited
information - even though it might be excellent
information – a blog is unlimited in the variety of
information and interest it can offer.
2. Because of this, putting creative, intriguing stories,
interesting observations, critical comments or views
on current topics can attract a very wide audience
from anywhere in the world. This can send new
visitors your site that you’d never have attracted
otherwise.
3. Many bogs are accidentally found while a user is
searching for something else.
4. What you put in your blog, if it’s of interest, can
be quoted, linked to and sent on to others at any
time, even long after you’ve written it.
5. You can immediately see reaction to what you’ve
posted in readers comments and get an insight into
how your blogs are being received out there.
6. Blogging is a great way to build your influence as
an expert in your field. Little by little, post after post,
you can show customers you’re the one to go to
and gain competitive advantage.
7. The more you write, the ore you develop your
skills as a writer. Always a plus.
8. You create a source of more email contacts.
9. Because you need to fill your blog regularly, it will
keep you keen to look out for and research new
material, helping your thinking about your business
to stay fresh and inspiring innovation.
10. It gives you an opportunity to feature a particular
product or service from a new angle and see how it
affects sales.
6. SOCIAL MEDIA AND ONLINE MARKETING
6.1 What is online marketing?

Online marketing is also called internet marketing or digital marketing and describes the use
of a variety of tools and strategies to deliver messages to consumers on the internet. It both
increases the ability of a business to be found online and promotes aspects of a business in
an effort to attract interaction and trade from customers ahead of its competitors.
There are many tools you can use to promote your business online –website, blogging, email
marketing, SEO marketing, online advertising and, probably the most powerful tool for a small
new business, social media.
6.2 The power of social media
Two of the biggest advantages of social media tools for a start up business are:
1. its limitless potential reach, and
2. its cost effectiveness.
Social media is a collection of free platforms where you can let a wide audience know who you
are and what you do. It is transforming the way business is done and how organisations grow.
It’s a world well worth become intimately familiar with. People now expect to find you there so
if you don’t have a presence you might look like you weren’t invited to your street’s end of
summer barbeque. To show how powerful it is, a recent study by the Internet Advertising
Bureau in the UK found that almost 80% of consumers were more likely to give repeat business
to companies they were familiar with on social media.
For little or no cost, you can use social media to introduce yourself to the online community,
build a reputation, attract followers and entice consumers to use your services. You can also
choose to pay to advertise your business. Much of the effectiveness of social media in
spreading good news about you and your business is due to the human desire to share
experiences and stories – word of mouth.
6.3 Rules of engagement

Engaging in social media is similar to moving to a new area and starting to get to know the
locals. Many of the same rules of engagement apply. It’s good to be friendly but also polite; to
be aware when there’s a natural point in the conversation to talk about yourself but not to the
extent that you bore or annoy your listener; to be humorous and interesting but to remain
respectful. What you want is to be known, liked and popular so people want to do business
with you.
6.4 Prepare a social media marketing plan

If you’re not already active on social media and would like to, don’t dive in headlong. It’s worth
preparing a social media marketing plan so it’s more likely to work well for you. Be clear about
what objectives you’re hoping to achieve. You’ll already have drawn a profile of your target
audience. Develop this in greater detail. What are their interests - both with regard to your
industry and personal? Where do they live? What kind of taste, habits, and lifestyles do they
have? This will guide you as to which social network(s) you’re most likely to find them in and
the kind of conversations they’ll be involved in - in other words, where you can engage with
them.
Will your only objective be to drive traffic to your website? Will you be running competitions on
your Facebook page? Is building your mailing list your first objective? Do you just want to raise
awareness of an issue? If you have a clear plan from the beginning it will help your focus and
you can refer back to it to check your success. Social media can be distracting and lead you
in directions that won’t necessarily fit your plan. Keep asking “Is this helping to grow my
business?”
6.5 Manage your online presence

Will it be just you who’s posting and driving content for social media? If you’re allowing a staff
member, family member or friend help with your communication, always check the content.
They might be more familiar with using this type of media but you are ultimately responsible
for what’s posted in your name. Bear in mind the social rules mentioned above. Everything you
say must represent you in the right voice and in a way that shows you in a good light. Are you
prepared for any questions, comments or enquiries you may get?
Be consistent with your presence. Don’t start with a flurry of activity and then realise you can’t
afford to give social media that level of time. Keep your posts at a steady stream and a pace
you can manage while you get on with running your business.
Building your community can be one of the most daunting things about starting a social media
profile. You won’t have the team of dedicated people and resources that very large companies
have, but neither will you need the bulky numbers of followers they are aiming for. It’s possible
to attract thousands of people to ‘like’ you on facebook to enter a competition but unless you’re
gathering an audience that will have an ongoing interest in you, it’s not a valuable following.
It’s much better to aim for less numbers and engage a relevant audience with whom you can
build a loyal and successful relationship.
Cross sell yourself – promote your social media presence on your website, cards, stationery,
brochures, advertising, news features and promotions. Gather an email list so you can grow
your relationship through newsletters and referral programmes. To get a following going, it may
be worth some investment. Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin now offer low budget advertising
which allows you to specify the profile of person you’re aiming at and their interests. They will
suggest posts and followers and you only pay when your ad is clicked on.
6.6 How to be likeable on social media

Even though keeping an eye on competitors is necessary in business, don’t be put off by
someone bigger than you being more active and having more followers. Search for hash tags
that are relevant to you and join in conversations that you can stand out in. A number of
approaches tend to be successful in attracting followers and making them feel valued:
 Ask questions about their experiences. They can be directly relevant to your industry
or related.
 Share their problems with the community (but don’t be too personal) and invite advice
and answers.
 Post interesting material – about your experience, an industry insight, a current topic
etc.
 Be humorous. Laughter is one of the best ways to form relationships.
 Share stories or quotes. If they happen to be from or about someone in the limelight it
could get you lots of attention. (Again, be careful with boundaries.)
Try to include keywords that are relevant to your business to help with SEO but don’t just post
material about your products or service. People will find you boring, tedious and self absorbed.
Get to know what’s going on around you and join in so people get to know you and will use
your company when they need it or recommend you to a friend. Take advantage of being a
small business – you’re the friendly, approachable, understanding one. As well as helping the
profile of your business, if you run yours on your own, instead of feeling isolated and
unsupported at times, social media can help you feel part of the buzz and activity of a thriving
community.
6.7 A picture is worth a thousand words

A visual presence can be a magnetic way to attract attention and followers. While Facebook is
predominantly about sharing stuff that has just happened and twitter is a current conversation,
there are some really attractive and creative social networks that are primarily visual, like
Pinterest, Instagram and Vine. Pinterest attracts about 53 million users globally every month.
75% of those do so on mobile phones. It’s where users can post their personal collection of
pictures on any topic to share, show or plan. Companies see huge opportunities to have
pictures of their products shared and are using it to encourage this. You can use Instagram to
post both pictures and videos. Vine, a video network which limits clips to 6 seconds, is popular
for the ‘sneak insight’ feeling it gives.
Videos can be an ingenious and inexpensive way to build an individual personality for your
brand. You don’t need a costly production company or choreographer and flash mob. Even
global brands film their own employees doing their work, chatting to customers or commenting
on what they like about their jobs. You could make a short clip on a quirky element of your
service or be creative with a camera and take a close up of an attractive corner of one of your
products. Let these visual tools create a story about your business.
LinkedIn has a more professional emphasis. It’s your chance to post your credentials and
experience and confirm your credibility to anyone who wants to check you out. See more on
using LinkedIn groups in section 4.4, Building your business network.
Once you’ve begun engaging on social media networks, it’s important to monitor the success
of your different posts and conversations so you know which approaches to drop or continue.
Keep track of when you’re mentioned and of any conversations about you or surrounding your
business. There are many tools that can help with this: Google alerts, Hoot suite, Vocus, Future
Tweet and Social mention.
What a successful social media strategy gives you is invaluable insight into and connection
with your customers, potential customers and suppliers so you can continue to tailor your
business to the needs and wants of your target audience and act on new opportunities to keep
you relevant and growing.
6.8 Facebook
Nearly everyone now searches for what they want online before making a move towards a
purchase. As well as your website, consumers will expect to see your Facebook business page
to get a closer look at who you are and what you’re about. With over a billion active users, it’s
by far the biggest social networking platform there is.
To create a Facebook page for your business is very simple:
1. Just log onto https://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php and click on ‘Local Business or
Place.’
2. Next, fill in your business category, name, location and phone number, agree to T&Cs and
click ‘Get started’.
3. On the next page, enter a brief description of your business, your website address (you can
enter more than one) and choose a facebook address. Click ‘Save Info’.
4. Upload a profile picture. Use an attractive cover photo that represents you or use your
business logo. You’ll have the option of uploading a larger cover photo soon. Click ‘Next’.
5. Add your page to your favourites for easy access or skip this option if you wish.
6. Next you’ll be invited to ‘Promote your page’ to reach more people which is asking you to
pay for advertising. You can skip this page.
Done! Now you can get started posting content!
Post lots of relevant, interesting content that visitors will be likely to ‘like’. Use photos, video
clips, articles and promotions to create a lively feel. Short, visual posts have the most impact.
The Admin Panel ‘Edit Page’ button allows you to update page info, edit settings, manage
admin roles and use your activity log. Once your page has been ‘Liked’ 30 times, you can use
the ‘Page insights’ tool to access information on the patterns of your visitors. Post about twice
a week, be friendly, conversational and polite and respond promptly to private messages and
comments. Don’t overdo it with sales messages – it turns users off.
You can use up to 11 apps on your facebook page, only 4 will be visible. Photos will always
show as the top one and by clicking on the down arrow to the right of app icons you can see
additional ones. In ‘Page Admin’, you can rearrange which ones are visible by clicking on the
same down arrow (Edit, swap position with). Show the apps you make most use of.
Promotions
Facebook promotions are a way for you to engage your followers in a fun, exciting or interesting
way. For example, you make your own beautiful crafts, have a manageable number in your
audience and want to run a competition to win an attractive piece of your work. Post a picture
of your prize; invite people to engage with comments, messages or perhaps sharing where
they would display the craftwork. You’ll choose the most inspiring post as the winner. It’s a free
and very easy way to invite interaction and interest from your audience. People love getting
something free! You can pay for ads to send your post to your fans, this is optional.
Before you go ahead with a promotion, consider a few things:
 Are you able to predict the kind of numbers who may post a comment/message?
 Will you be able to manage this number?
 Will you have time to read all and fairly pick winner? People are very discerning and
will easily spot any lack of integrity.
 People can edit their posts after submitting them and also post negative ones. Can you
foresee anything that might invite negativity and avoid attracting it?
6.9 LinkedIn
LinkedIn is like an online CV or Resume, but more interactive. Creating a LinkedIn profile gives
you the chance to show your collection of qualifications, skills, talents and experience. It also
allows you to network with people that fit the profile of customer you’re looking for and other
people in business you’d like to engage with. You can also invite endorsements from former
colleagues. By searching for groups connected to your idea you can participate in
conversations, answer questions, offer tips and share common information. Or you could
create your own group. It’s not so much a space to look for sales as to build connections that
may be helpful and show yourself as a trustworthy and reliable business owner who does great
quality work. You can follow others whose profiles you like and if you get an appropriate chance
to build a relationship, request a connection.
Creating a LinkedIn profile is easy. Go to www.linkedin.com. Sign up by entering your name,
email address and password.
You’ll be sent an email with a link to confirm your account. Once you’ve confirmed, you can
sign in and get started on building your profile. You’ll be taken through easy to follow steps to
add your sub heading, area of work and industry and asked to upload a profile picture. You’ll
notice that most people post a professionally taken picture. It’s worth investing in one so you
look professional too.
Next, enter your qualifications. Add your current employment, your past positions and your
education history. Write concise but informative descriptions of previously held jobs and
qualifications gained. Don’t worry if your career history seems diverse. Nowadays, careers
grow from pulling together a combination of sometimes seemingly unconnected sets of skills.
Your combination might be just what someone is looking for.
The summary section is where you can expand on and emphasise the skills or experiences
that are your best selling points. Highlight your strengths and ambitions. The add specialities
section serves a similar function to the summary. The skills you list here can be endorsed by
people you are connected to. Use it as a chance to be endorsed in the areas you want to
promote.
Next, you can allow LinkedIn to search through your email contacts to find any who are already
on LinkedIn and request that they connect with you. You can also search for people by entering
a name, company or job title.
You can add links on your page to your business website, your blog, Twitter account or
Facebook page. Be sure you’re happy to expose everything posted on either one before adding
a link. Will it add to your professionalism or take from it?
Search for groups using keywords relevant to you. Joining a group can be informative and
useful. You can connect with and converse with people in the same or relevant areas and
share ideas, comment and hold online events.
6.10 Google + Business
Though it’s not as big as Facebook, Google + is too big a marketing tool to ignore - it now has
over 500 million users, 135 million of whom are active daily. It’s free and offers your business
many marketing opportunities to connect with your target audience and other businesses
related to yours. Undoubtedly, the level of activity doesn’t come close to matching Face book’s
but the many advantages you may gain are certainly worth trying it.
+1s are the equivalent of Face book ‘Likes’. Having +1s attached to your content, articles,
videos etc boosts your rankings in Google searches. Each time you add content to your media,
add the +1 button. As soon as a new post is added, it’s indexed by Google immediately,
meaning it’s available while it’s hot off the presses when people search for that topic.
When you link your Google+ profile to your website, your photo will show up next to your
content in searches, giving you a big advantage in recognition. It also attributes authorship to
you. Statistics also show more click throughs on these search results as they stand out more
and also leads to traffic to your profile. Google+ Local pages which we mentioned already, are
also indexed in search results. You can set up Google+ Communities which give your
customers a platform to share views, comments etc.
Google+ allows you to create Circles which group people in ways that makes it easy for you to
be selective about sharing different information. You may want to create a circle for regular,
loyal customers, one for suppliers or perhaps one for media contacts - whatever suits your
needs.
Google+ Hangouts is another excellent feature. It’s a video chat service that allows you to talk
either one to one or with up to ten people. It intuitively focuses on the person currently talking
and during the conversation you can share documents, images and videos with your group.
You can also use ‘Hangouts on Air’ to broadcast live video that anyone on a web browser can
access.
As well as Google themselves, there are many sites that offer clear, step by step guides to
setting up and using Google+. Here are a couple of examples:
 http://smallbiztrends.com/2013/06/create-a-google-plus-page.html
 http://www.simplybusiness.co.uk/microsites/googleplus-for-small-businesses/
6.11 Twitter
Twitter has taken over as one of the single best ways to generate new business online. It gives
you an unprecedented opportunity to build relationships with individuals who may be interested
in what you have to offer. Before you can expect any relationship to turn into a sale, though,
you must create trust and credibility without looking like you’re really trying. Initially, everyone
is a stranger – you’re starting from a blank canvas. Everything you say and post builds your
persona. You can search for conversations that may be relevant to you and join in. Ask
questions, answer questions, solve problems. Let others know you’re open to accommodating
their interest and to following up by phone or email.
You can attract new followers by sharing interesting things that would catch your customers
attention, like new innovations you learned at a trade show, insights you picked up at a
conference or pictures of great products you carry. These can all be shared live, adding to the
excitement. You can also blog about these on your website. By using official hash tags from
large events in your tweets you can be included in larger conversations and seen by a big
group of non followers. Posting content that gets you noticed in the right way is the trick.
Pay particular attention to those who follow your conversation, comment or retweet your
information and connect when it feels appropriate so you can develop the relationship further.
Statistics show that people are much more likely to do business with those they have some
kind of relationship with than those they don’t.
As well as Twitter’s own help centres, there are many sites that give guidelines on how to get
set up and started on Twitter, like:
 http://www.aliciacowan.com/social-media-and-digital-marketing/twitter/set-up-twitter-
account,
 http://www.wikihow.com/Use-Twitter
 http://www.digitaltrends.com/how-to/how-to-use-twitter/#!ArVfd
or search for more that suit your level of knowledge
6.12 Blog
Blogging for your business is probably one of the best ways to build your online visibility. It’s
effective and it’s cheap. It multiplies your chances of being seen and found in internet searches,
even by accident. Blogging is a marketing tool that gives you unlimited opportunities for posting
new content and for reaching more and more potential customers and curious searchers all
the time.
If you’ve never blogged or are unsure what it is, it’s like a newsroom (in writing) attached to
your business website that broadcasts anything your customers might be interested in with a
view to driving them to your website, building belief and trust in your business and creating
excitement about your business. The more often you add new posts, the more you increase
the likelihood of being found online.
Some benefits of blogging:
1. Build traffic to your site.
Your website is your shop front. (Or your shop if you sell online). The more people you can get
to visit it, the more chances you have to turn them into customers. Customers that already
know you probably know your web address or company name and can use that to search for
you. But you need to reach people who don’t already know you. Blogging is a great way you
reach out and catch new potential customers.
Regular blogging is like moving your shop front from an obscure laneway to a busy high street.
One of the elements that pushes you up the results page of searches is the number of pages
on your website. Adding more and more pages will just clutter your site, hinder navigation and
may not help your ranking. The perfect answer is blogging. You can add as many new blog
posts as you can generate and every time you do it’s a tick in your copybook in the Google
school. They love new content, especially when it’s good quality, relevant to your business and
answers peoples wants, needs, questions or problems.
2. Build trust, credibility and a strong brand.

Blogging is very sociable. Anyone in business knows making connections is invaluable. When
those connections spread the word about you and endorse your business it can be your most
powerful marketing action. This is what happens with blogging.
Each time you post a new blog, you’re publishing material that anyone can read and share on
any social network – Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+ or Pinterest. Imagine the potential
exposure to the number of people engaging on those social platforms! In other words, every
time you compose a blog containing information, something interesting, amusing, entertaining
or an answer to a problem or question, you give yourself the chance of this being passed on
and on again to an unlimited audience. And not just when it’s new, for as long as it’s there.
Many blogs are found and quoted years after being posted.
This also works the other way around. You can use your repertoire of blogs as a resource to
use on your own social media, which in turn can lead people back to your blogs and to your
site.
Bearing all this in mind, get past any reluctance you may feel to being a published author and
blog to your heart’s content! It’s a fantastic tool to let people see your expertise, experience,
integrity, commitment, reliability, trustworthiness, helpfulness and much more. Try not to fit too
much into each blog. Keep it short, easy to read and with just one message. If you think of
marketing messages as oranges that you want your audience to catch, throwing one at a time
instead of a bunch means they are much more likely to be caught.
3. Turn new traffic into customers.

Now that you’ve moved your shop front to the high street by posting many outstandingly
inspiring blogs and head turning tweets, it’s time to influence all those passersby to become
your customers. The main way to do this is to put a call to action at the end of each blog post.
You’re encouraging the reader to click on your ‘Sign up now for our free leaflet on how to...’
button or your ‘Click here to get a free voucher for...’ button and ask for their email address
which is then in your database and you can further market your business to.
More reasons to blog:
 You don’t have to be a previously published author to write a blog. Yes, it should be
readable and reasonably well written but you won’t lose marks in English class if it’s
not perfect. Most aren’t and that’s not the goal of a blog. And, the more you do it, the
better you get.
 You get to know your audience. Comments on your blogs tell you a lot about your
customers which you can use to refine your business to serve them even better. You
can also use analytics to see what topics are popular, what gets shared, when people
visit and more, building even more useful insight.
 It keeps you being creative and proactive about your business. Coming up with new
content that’s worth posting continually can be challenging but it also forces you to do
useful thinking on what new things can keep your business fresh and attractive. It also
means you’re more likely to read what others in your industry are currently blogging
about so you keep up with the latest developments and know how to get your business
ahead.
 A good bank of blogs with credible content can lead you to be quoted or interviewed as
an expert in your field, a PR dream!
 According to a recent survey by Hub Spot, one of the biggest internet marketers &
bloggers, 60% of businesses who blog gain more customers as a result.
 If you work on your own it can sometimes feel isolating. Blogs plus social media help
you feel connected.
There are easy to use blogging platforms like Wordpress, Blogger or Type pad or you can ask
to your website designer about how to set yours up.
6.13 YouTube
It may not come to mind when you think of social media but if your business lends to it,
YouTube can be a powerful marketing tool. Many people absorb information much more
willingly from a visual source rather than a written one. Watching a video is much easier and
often much more memorable than reading a chunk of information. The popularity of video
watching is increasing so much that TV audiences are diminishing. The fact that so many video
clips are short, very accessible and sharable means they slip into people’s lives like sand
between stones.
Reasons to use YouTube:
 Like blogging and other social media, adding original video content to your site
increases your SEO ranking for a few reasons:
o Search engines recognise how popular it is with so many people and the
chances that they’ll pass it on are high.
o Because it’s a very engaging type of content, visitors to your site will tend to
watch and stay longer.
o It improves the quality and variety of your content.
 There are qualities and visual appeal you can get across in a video that you can’t
describe in words. An image can also have a powerful emotional impact and leave a
lasting impression.
 The likelihood of a video being shared is even higher that with written content.
 With such accessible technology, video content can be produced quickly, inexpensively
and spontaneously and uploaded as soon as it’s recorded. Many videos that have gone
viral and had views in the millions were recorded on phones.
 Speaking of phones, so much browsing more is now done on phones rather than PCs
or laptops. Video technology has more than kept pace with the integration with phone
technology, often more efficiently than other types of content.
6.14. Pinterest
As visuals have the potential for huge impact and are powerful ways to inspire consumer
engagement, Pinterest has a unique advantage in social media. If your business has an
attractive visual appeal this is one you should explore. You can create a collage of pictures
that give ideas, show new ways of using your products or services and showcase stunning
finished effects. There are many more social media sites that are specific to particular
industries, sectors and interests. Browse and experiment to see which ones could benefit you.
6.15. Skype
Almost all start up businesses need to keep an eye on cost, especially ongoing ones, like
communication bills. Thanks to Skype, you no longer need to rely only on email for your
communication with suppliers, clients and industry colleagues in order to save money. Many
times a person to person call is a much more appropriate way to communicate – human
interaction has more depth to it than a mail and builds a strong connection.
With Skype, thanks to their use of VoIP, (Voice over internet Protocol), calls to others on Skype
are free when both parties are connected to the internet and calls to landlines or mobiles cost
a fraction of what other communications companies charge. With 550 million users worldwide
and growing, here is where you need to be. You can buy Skype credit for your account which
goes a long way.
You can also use Skype to send written messages, which are received instantaneously (faster
than phone texts) and share files, videos, pictures and more. Set up a Skype account for your
business from the start and as well as keeping your communication costs to a minimum, your
connections happen efficiently.
When your empire starts to build, there are more advanced features available on Skype that
may be of use to you – check them out online.
6.16. Email marketing

With so many shiny new personalities in the social media arena, email marketing might seem
like the dated relative in last decade’s fashions. But email marketing is still a really powerful
tool for small business and one to be considered seriously as part of your online promotion.
Why?
 Email marketing has been tried and tested and comes out looking good. According to
a 2014 report by Exact Target, a top digital marketing company, 68% of marketers
included in the study said email marketing was core to their business and 88% believe
email marketing produces good ROI. In other words, it works. More people buy as a
result of a marketing message received by email than through Face book or text.
 Email has a particular feel to it – less casual than social media but more personal than
advertising or direct mail. It helps the user feel directly spoken to and strengthens
relationships, loyalty and trust. It builds one to one relationships with customers. (This
assumes it’s well written and presented and has the right tone – not too personal or
invasive, engaging and not too long.)
 It gives you a chance to show more of your business and its personality and increase
awareness of your brand. You can show your expertise or focus on a particular aspect
of your business. People buy from people they trust and are familiar with - this is an
excellent way of building trust and increasing familiarity.
 With so many email marketing templates now available, it’s really easy to set up a
regular email newsletter. They are excellently designed so you just have to fill in your
content, click a few buttons and away you go!
Here are a few to check out but there are many more – do some research and see which one
suits you best. Many templates also offer additional features that could help you make your
choice:
 Mail Chimp
 Benchmark
 iContact
 MadMimi
 Constant Contact
 Get Response
One crucial thing to bear in mind before you set up your email marketing is whether the
template you choose has a mobile img-fluid design.
7. PUBLIC RELATIONS AND ADVERTISING
7.1 Look for PR opportunities

Public Relations is the relaying of information to the public about you and your business that
you hope will impress and influence them to use your service or buy your products. In other
words, it’s good publicity. It’s allowing the public to hear third party endorsement of you, your
product or your service. While advertising says “I’m the best!”, PR says “I hear she’s the best.”
The main reason PR is important for new, small businesses is because they usually don’t have
the budget for advertising campaigns and need to rely on finding free or cost effective ways to
spread the word about their services.
Always be on the lookout for opportunities for free PR but think before jumping in and use them
wisely. For example, radio chat shows are an ideal way to get free publicity. Listen for any
discussions where you can offer a service or solve a problem. DJs hate to feel they’re being
used for a free ad so make sure the angle is worthy enough for you to look good and not that
you’re not just trying to take advantage of airtime.
You’re a professional make up artist. A local theatre group are on looking for props and
costumes for their production to save on costs. Call and offer to do the make up for the main
cast members and give some basic training to a backstage member for future productions. Not
only are you getting excellent publicity on the radio (and the theatre company will love you!),
you can tweet when you’re backstage, post a link to a YouTube clip of the performance on
your Facebook page, blog about the night afterwards and post the pictures in a collage on
Pinterest. A whole PR campaign from one phone call! Engage your creative thinking and look
for other opportunities to get your business featured in activities in your area.
Giving free information is good PR.
Giving free information related to the service or products you offer on your website or in leaflets
has become so much a standard practice it’s almost expected but it is good PR. Yes, many
people will take the information and run. You won’t benefit from their custom. But others will
follow up and give you business.
Being open and generous with information you could charge for might seem counterproductive
but it helps your ranking in online searches, gives you credibility and increases your profile. It
also creates a good relationship between you and your audience. People love getting
something cost free. Existing clients feel you’re givin g something back in return for custom
and potential clients feel good about you, trust you and are more willing to become a paying
customer. You may also gather customers by accident when they stumble on you when
searching for something else.
Talks
If your business is very much dependent on the support of your local community, giving a free
talk is a great way to inform your catchment area about what you do and how they can benefit
from using your service. To give more of an incentive to attend, give a special offer or discount
to those who come. Ask other related businesses to join in, sharing the cost of hiring a room
and adding interest. Building your profile in your local area is great PR. People like supporting
local businesses and remain loyal to those they like and are familiar with.
7.2 . Brainstorming
As a new entrepreneur, PR is very much about being creative, about finding and using
resources that don’t cost and about consistency. One free and invaluable resource is to use
brainstorming. Gather together the most dynamic, clear thinking and creative people you have
in your circle and set up a PR brainstorming session. For the cost of a home cooked meal, you
could harness invaluable ideas and powerful insight in just one evening and have fun as you’re
doing it.
When you’re close to your business it can be hard to stand back and see it from the perspective
of the general public or from a fresh angle. Other may see it in ways that you’d never have
thought of. Don’t rule anything out until you’ve ruled a few good ideas in. Sometimes what
seems like a silly idea can turn into the best PR exercise. Record everything that’s proposed
– you may implement some ideas now and return to others down the list at a later stage.
7.3 Writing an effective press release

A press release is a brief announcement to the media about your business that you want
journalists, radio presenters and other media outlets to give exposure to. Journalists are always
on the lookout for interesting material but the problem is they get so many releases, most end
up in the bin. You must make yours attention grabbing, newsworthy and credible to reach the
top of the pile.
Don’t be general – it’s too bland. Highlight a particular angle or a new message that would
make the public sit up and pay attention. Put this in your headline with a good subheading
underneath and explain it in the first paragraph. You’ll only have a few seconds before a
journalist will decide to move on or keep reading.
Next, answer Who? What? Where? When? and Why? Here you give them all the information
they need about who you are, where to find you, what you do, when you’re launching/having
an event and why customers would be interested.
A quote from a satisfied client which clearly underlines the benefits of using your business is a
good way to finish. You could also mention your future plans and goals. List your contact details
clearly to make it easy for a journalist to contact you.
7.4 Radio/Press interview

If you’re fortunate enough to be offered an interview on radio or by a press journalist which
allows you to promote your business, jump at it! After the initial excitement, though, most
people will find the idea quite daunting. It is important to be well prepared before you do an
interview and this will also help settle your nerves. Here are a few tips:
 Knowing your subject matter inside out is essential but not enough. You need to keep the
focus in any interview to one message or at most a small number of points. Remember
what we said to bear in mind when writing a blog? Keep it short, easy to read and with just
one message. If you think of marketing messages as oranges that you want your audience
to catch, throwing one at a time instead of a bunch means they are much more likely to be
caught.The same applies to an interview. Prepare the message or short points you want
to get across beforehand and stick to them. Even if the interviewer tries to steer you away
to other things, find a way to be assertive, politely, and come back to your focus. Practice
as much as you can with a pretend but challenging interviewer before the real one.
 Do your homework on the interviewer or journalist beforehand. For what reason were you
asked to do the interview? Is there a specific question or topic you’re expected to talk
about? You must address this before the points you prepared above. What is his interview
style? What else has she written in this field? How experienced is he? What agenda has
the journalist/producer set? Providing something that makes the journalists job easier, even
if it doesn’t benefit you will make you popular and that’s always good! (Like results of
research or anecdotal stories.) What’s the editorial focus of the publication? What’s the
profile of the listenership? How big and audience will you have? Is it local or nationwide?
 Try to anticipate any challenging questions you might be asked, especially if you had any
bad publicity. They’ll want to know, and it’s your chance to show, that you can reassure the
public that any problems are in the past and your business has not only rectified any
problems but improved. Have a brief list of any facts and figures you might need to quote.
7.5. Generate newsworthy ideas

As the saying goes, a newspaper doesn’t refuse print. In other words, all media sources, both
online and traditional, need content. Claim some space in there. To get your business featured
in the media, you need to pick out interesting aspects that will appeal to the public. A good
idea is to focus on a story involving one of your clients – human interest articles are always
popular. Try to find an uplifting, inspiring angle. It may be worth paying a PR professional or
writer to come up with good material. If you’re planning an event that could provide a photo
opportunity, make sure to invite the press. A featured photo in the media is instantly eye
catching and memorable.
7.6 Advertising
You need to think carefully before spending money on advertising a small business. While it
can be effective, it can also be expensive and results are often unpredictable.
One of the golden rules about advertising is to have a clear, simple message. It’s unlikely you’ll
have the budget to employ an advertising agency to come up with your central message or a
slick campaign but it is worth informing yourself on how it’s done. Read some books on the
great advertising agencies, giving examples of concepts that transformed company profiles
and sales. You may pick up enough to be able to look at your business critically and come up
with an idea that captures your business in a way that appeals enough to get you noticed and
more importantly, gets you new customers.
Focus on the benefits of your offer, not the features. For example, if you’re a professional
makeup artist, instead of advertising the range of products you use, tell women how confident
they’ll feel when you apply their makeup. If you’re an event planner, instead of advertising the
great computer package you use to stay organised, reassure people how calm and in control
they’ll feel when you plan and manage their event.
Effective ads often focus on one aspect or product and generate interest or curiosity that can
then lead people to discover other services or products.
Online advertising can be effective but you need to know your paid ads are reaching a relevant
audience. For many small businesses that depend on their local community for sales, yellow
pages advertising is the investment that yields the best return.
Being listed in online business directories can be an invaluable way to advertise. It won’t give
you a chance to sell yourself in any detailed way but can help you feature well in search engine
rankings.
Many magazines, free and local newspapers will offer to feature your business in return for a
paid ad. This can be a good way to spread the word on what you do. Negotiate. There is always
room for them to discount their ad space. Drive a good bargain.
If you do spend money on advertising, include a way of measuring the effectiveness – add in
a coupon or include a code and always ask new customers where they heard of you.
Brand Ambassadors
One great way to get free advertising is to use Brand Ambassadors. A brand ambassador is
someone who wears your service or product with style and has a wide reach of influence. It
could be a family member who is very sociable and popular and has a wide circle of contacts.
If you’re a dog groomer, you could offer free grooming to a few friends dogs in return for their
endorsement of you to as many people as they can, showing the great results. An image
consultant could do a dramatic transformation of a public figure, for example a local politician
who’s about to appear on TV, and post the story on your website and social media, with
permission.
Today, a website is a must for all businesses, no matter what their size. Before customers
decide to come to you they are highly likely to have done online research, even those who got
a personal referral. Your website is your online shop window, your chance to look appealing,
be appealing and reassure the up-for-grabs customer that you will answer his needs better
than the competitors whose sites he will also check out. You can use it to show yourself off at
your best and build valuable credibility. If you don’t have a website you’ll look inadequate to
clients so it’s a necessary investment but probably not as costly as you think.
If you’ve grown up in the digital age, you’ll already have lots of ideas on creating an online
presence that accurately represents you and actively works to promote you. If you’re
uncomfortable or unfamiliar with anything digital, don’t be put off. You may feel it’s an alien
world you know little about but, far from being scary, it’s exciting, intriguing and can be a huge
asset to your business. Also, there’s a wealth of good quality information available online which
will educate you on everything you need to know about creating a website - what’s important,
what’s crucial, what to avoid and how to keep it working hard for you. Ask someone you know
who’s knowledgeable about website creation to get you started in the right direction. Next are
some basic guidelines but we recommend you add to these by spending time searching for
more detailed information online.
8.SALES
8.1 Sales campaigns

A sales campaign is a great way to boost sales at particular times. A campaign uses a planned
strategy to market a particular product or service of your business through a particular sales
channel or several channels. It’s aimed at likely prospects with the intention of turning a good
percentage of them into customers and increase sales.
When planning a sales campaign, think it through fully before you launch it. You need to do
some figures to see if the potential return will be worth any investment you need to make. What
sales channels will you implement it through? Your own premises?Your website?Your social
media platforms?Direct mail?In conjunction with other business partners or suppliers? For
example, a hair stylist could run a campaign offering a particular product at half price with every
appointment booked during a particular week and the manufacturer of the product might cover
or share advertising costs. A makeup artist and image stylist could partner to offer their joint
list of customers a styling and make up session for less than the separate cost of each.
Estimate how much you will need to spend to roll out the campaign and the potential sales you
think it will generate, taking into account your reduced sales price. Will the profit be worth the
outlay? Set a goal for the level of sales you intend to reach. This gives a focus to work towards
and strive hard to achieve as well as ‘claiming’ that figure from the universe.
A campaign usually runs over a limited period of time. This is part of the strategy – to give a
sense of urgency to the consumer and motivate her to buy. Offering something at better value
than normal and restricting its availability has a proven psychological effect of encouraging
people to take the advantage while they can. It’s essential, then, to pitch the campaign so your
customers recognise the value on offer and you entice new customers who also recognise the
good deal.
Sales campaigns are a great way of winning new clients who will stay loyal if they like what
they get and experience from you. Decide before you start how long the campaign will run for.
If sales go particularly well you may be tempted to extend your time limit but, for credibility and
reputation, it’s better to finish the campaign when you advertised it would and run another in a
month or so to capture that willing audience again. In the meantime, take advantage of the
interest to build anticipation for your next one.
8.2 Your sales pitch

Like all aspects of doing business, things have changed dramatically over the past couple of
decades and a ‘pitch’ is probably no longer a good term to describe the attempts to sell of your
service or product. Gone are the days when a sales person just ‘pitched’ information to a
prospective customer.
Selling is now done with the intention of creating an interactive engagement with a potential
customer. It’s a two way conversation during which you ask questions, listen, answer queries
and problems, show understanding and offer solutions.What hasn’t changed is that first
impressions still matter. Great salesmanship comes with plenty practice but it’s always based
on being good with people and having the right mix of politeness and friendliness. The tone is
one of informal engagement with respectful boundaries. You need to be skilled in capturing
and holding the attention of your customer or audience.
Some tips that may help:
1. Know your customer. The more you understand the needs and wants of your target
audience, the better you can outline the benefits you know answer those needs and wants.
2. Know what you’re selling really well. Memorise relevant facts or statistics that prove its worth.
Mention well known satisfied customers. Most importantly, keep engaging the customer.
3. Focus on a particular problem in your customers lives and shoe how you offer a solution
and help make their lives easier.
4. Be prepared for the common objections you’ll get and have your counter arguments ready.
Know how to differentiate your product/service from competitors. If the objection is budget
related, show how you save them money.
5. Make sure you allow enough space and time to listen to your customer. That’s the key to
finding the problem that you can offer the answer to.
6. Have your call to action ready at the right time. Encourage your customer to commit now to
doing a deal. If he’s not ready now, arrange a follow up meeting.
8.3 Lead generation

With such easy availability of all the knowledge, products and services people want now at the
click of a few buttons, the buying public is savvy and up to date with what they can have or do.
They no longer respond to the old approach of ‘being sold’ something. As a result, in the digital
age, the focus on generating sales is shifting to facilitating purchases.
What this means is you need to be thinking about facilitating your customers to buy when
compiling all the information you put into your marketing tools - your website, social media,
brochures, etc and also when building your brand. In fact, right through this course we’ve been
showing you how to generate sales by creating a business persona that makes it not just easy,
but enticing for your target customers to buy from you.
It can take time to build the relationship with your customers that inspires enough trust and
loyalty to turn into robust sales figures. But we think by now you’re more than ready to get your
business off to a great start that has a clear vision for success. Keep portraying you and your
business in the way customers want to engage with and buy from, repeatedly. All valuable
content and engagement draws people closer to having you at the forefront of their minds
when they want what you offer.
Lead generation software is a system that focuses on the online behaviour of prospective
customers. It tracks actions from the initial engagement through the education process on
what’s being searched for and identifies the typical behaviour that indicates when they may be
ready to complete a sale. If you think this would be relevant and useful for your business and
worth the investment, do some research. Of course, the traditional methods of generating sales
also apply – following up interest with a personal phone call, sending mails to potential leads
or cold calling. When using these methods you have the benefit of referring prospects to your
online presence which will further support your efforts.
8.4 Pay per click advertising (PPC) and selling online
Pay per click advertising is when you pay for a listing in search results. These paid for listings
appear along with results which aren’t paid for. You bid for a listing for a particular keyword
your customer would use to search for what you offer. You’re bidding against any other
businesses that also want to bid for that keyword. The highest bidder will come up highest in
searches. You pay only when people click on that keyword and land on your site.
We recommend putting in a lot of thinking and learning about PPC advertising before you
spend, if you do at all. As you’ve learned in this course, there are plenty, effective ways of
increasing your SEO that don’t incur ongoing costs. PPC may not suit your business. If you
think it does, here are a few basic guidelines.
PPC advertising is instantaneous; you could actually see results straight away. Choosing
broad, general keywords would naturally mean that many other businesses will also be bidding
for the same ones and push up the price, but the predictability of the word means lots of people
will use it in searches. Choosing a word that’s more specific to your business narrows the field
of bidders and will cost less.
Don’t get distracted by other eager bidders and think you have to keep increasing your bid to
get ‘up there’ in searches for the particular search word or phrase you want. This could end up
costing you more than you can afford and also more than it’s worth to you in conversions.
Study the results of any PPC you invest in using analytics and only continue if you see tangible,
bottom line benefits. PPC can be most useful to boost a specific campaign over a short period,
rather than on an ongoing basis.
If your business sells directly online, your visitors are already potential customers and PPC
could give you the visibility and traffic to boost conversions and sales. If a conversion to you is
a visitor clicking on a sales enquiry form, downloading free information or signing up to your
email list, you’ll need to look closely at the percentage of these potential leads that converts to
a paying customer to decide if it’s worth paying to bring them to your site. Your investment
must return you a measurable, usable outcome.
To post a PPC ad, you’ll need to write a couple of short phrases that describe what you’re
advertising. Make sure spelling and grammar are perfect and they accurately and positively
describe your product or service. Check the rules – you’re generally not allowed to use
superlatives like ‘best’, ‘greatest’ etc. or capitalisation.
CONCLUSION
Traditional forms of marketing are slowly dying out, this trend continues in the
future. Now it’s the right moment to invest your time and money in digital
channels. Digital advertising is not expensive yet, and brings you fast and
quality results. If you think on investing in digital marketing – STOP
THINKING, JUST DO IT!
We hope you found this e-book interesting and educational. If you have any
additional questions or proposal, contact us on info.frrdesign@gmail.com.
Ultimately, if you want us to take care of your digital channels and provide
you with an influx of numerous customers - all you need to do write us, and
we will create a tailored-suit offer based on your specific needs!
We cheer for you - good luck!

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Digital Marketing Essentials

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DIGITAL MARKETING

FOR YOUR BUSINESS

The book ‘Digital Marketing for

your business’ brings you, without

hesitation, all the important

information about digital

WHO ARE WE?

FRR Design is built by passionate individuals, their ideas,

Our vision is scaling up your business activities by

1.1. Different pricing strategies

The four main, traditional pricing strategies are:

 Premium Pricing is placing a high price on a product or service when compared to

1. Know who you’re dealing with.

2. Be clear about agreed payment terms.

3. Develop good habits with invoicing

4. Allow for uneven cash flow

5. Deal with non-payment early

1.3. Promotion channels

 Visual promotion – signage, shop front.

1.5. After sales service – handling complaints and returns

When dealing with a complaining customer face to face:

2.1 Why have a marketing plan?

Some of the benefits to a good marketing plan:

 Outlines definable, ambitious but achievable goals.

2.2 Essential components for a marketing plan

3. Positioning and pricing

8. Online marketing strategy

9. Lead conversion strategy

 Having enough compelling content on your website to convince visitors to purchase or

10. Increasing price strategy

12. Financial projections

13. Executive summary

2.3 Sample marketing plan

Beautify me - 6 months marketing plan

4. Distribution Beautify Me premises. Once monthly stand up in upmarket department store.

Month 1 Month 2 Month 3 Month 4 Month 5 Month 6

13. Executive summary

This will be a busy marketing half year for Beautify Me.

3.1 Business image

3.2 Increase your visibility in your community

3.5 Business networking

4.1 Brand identity

4.3 Brand name and logo

4.4 Building your brand personality

4.6 Believe in your brand and your customers will too

5.1. Why do you need a website?

5.2 Setting up a website

5.3 Creating good content

5.6 Website analytics

One of the most effective and beneficial things you

6.1 What is online marketing?

6.2 The power of social media

6.3 Rules of engagement

6.4 Prepare a social media marketing plan

6.5 Manage your online presence

6.6 How to be likeable on social media

6.7 A picture is worth a thousand words

2. Build trust, credibility and a strong brand.

3. Turn new traffic into customers.

6.16. Email marketing

7.1 Look for PR opportunities

7.3 Writing an effective press release

7.4 Radio/Press interview