×
  • Leading Digital Marketing Agency
  • 900+ Websites Launched
  • $100M+ Client Revenue Generated








    855.686.4649 ext.707 Get A Proposal

    Tag: digital marketing services

    How to craft an effective social media marketing strategy

    Posted on by Alex Wilks

    The social media content that you choose to formulate and post holds great power for your brand. However, aimlessly posting is not the best method for turning followers into fans, which is why it’s important to develop a social media content strategy before you can fully explore the potential of each platform. Since it can be challenging to get noticed on the wide web, the best way to stand out on social media is to identify your specific goals and distribute them across the right platforms. This ensures that each post is valuable, aligned with those goals, and measurable, which allows you to fine-tune your strategy over time. Since there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to crafting an effective social media marketing strategy, you must first access your industry and audience, then build a plan that promotes longevity and growth for your brand. 

    Identify and set your goals 

    The first steps toward having a long-term social media marketing strategy are to set goals for your content. This includes the type of content you will post, how often, what time, and so forth. Having goals in mind helps you to plan, create, and facilitate content that embellishes brand values and reaches your audience. While you can start by making some generic marketing goals, such as increasing your following, it’s best to create a lasting social media marketing strategy that serves all of your goals long-term. Specifics allows you to tailor content to better meet your goals and to convert high sales by moving followers to a landing page as part of your marketing funnel. 

    Plan out your social content

    Once your goals are clear, it’s time to look at the content that you’ve created so far and make note of which posts are performing well and what platforms are getting the most recognition. Appropriately tagging your content will allow you to utilize analytics to achieve a holistic view of your social media content’s performance. Many social platforms also allow businesses to view page analytics directly. 

    During this phase, be sure to look closely at the language and tone you’re using on the underperforming content. It’s important to use your brand’s authentic voice so that followers know what to expect from your content. 

    Build a content calendar

    Part of distributing great content is planning, which is why it’s now time for you to build a social media content calendar. This allows you to have a space to organize and visualize your ideas so that they can be strategically executed.

    When planning, don’t be afraid to repurpose content and schedule it across different platforms at different times. This allows you to learn more about your audience’s engagement so that you know when and where you can get the most reach. 

    Promote and distribute content

    Since your social media marketing strategy goes beyond what you post on each channel, you will want to set up distribution allowing your posts to be shared widely. If you actively blog, be sure to post a snippet of this content on your social channels. If your audience admires what’s written, they may choose to share it among their friends, which offers you free distribution to new followers. Another way to effectively promote and distribute your content is to remember to ask questions. Encouraging people to share their answers on your post increases your engagement rate and keeps the post active.

    While posting content to go live immediately is a great way to show your followers that you’re an active business, you’re missing out on a massive opportunity. Pre-scheduling content and utilizing hashtags create a further reach, which allows you to network with others within your niche. You can also join other pages and link your comment in the comments section if it relates to the conversation. 

    Are there other methods that your brand uses as part of your social media marketing strategy? Drop a comment below to let us know.

    5 advantages to Amazon selling

    Posted on by Alex Wilks

    When it comes to online shopping, it’s no secret that many consumers order off of Amazon. With its convenient delivery methods and free shipping options, it’s a great way to introduce small e-commerce businesses to shoppers worldwide. This very attractive sales channel is an opportunity for vendors everywhere, however, it’s important to see if the advantages of Amazon selling are worth the cost for you. 

    Is Amazon selling right for your business?

    Amazon has brilliantly established itself as the world’s largest online retailer and while this company has a lineup of basic products under its name, most of what it sells is from other retailers. 

    That said, what are the pros of Amazon selling that draw in so many vendors?

    • More sales 
    • Gaining new customers
    • Possibility for international expansion
    • Low marketing costs
    • No stock

    More sales 

    Millions of active customers visit Amazon each month in search of products making it the number one place to shop online.

    By listing your products on Amazon, it’s far easier to gain credibility and trust with the consumer. That’s because of the great policies and customer service set in place. Rather than buying from a company a customer has never heard of, they purchase from that company with Amazon as the middleman. This ensures Amazon’s promise and excellence. 

    Gaining new customers

    As mentioned above, it’s likely that Amazon will help e-commerce businesses increase their sales and with that, build up their customer base. Since most users who utilize Amazon focus on finding the perfect product rather than who sells it, it works as an advantage for businesses who want to gain a wider audience. Plus, once they make their first purchase, they can be retargeted for other products by your company in the future. 

    International expansion

    As a globally trusted selling and buying platform, it makes it easy to branch into different markets. Shipping to over 100 countries worldwide, Amazon selling allows businesses to bridge new markets. 

    Low marketing costs

    Since Amazon already attracts millions of customers to its website daily, you don’t need to spend as much money to access them. Depending on your niche and how crowded the market is you can make significant marketing efforts will little effort or spending. After all, who does want to piggyback on Amazon’s success?

    No stock

    With 175 fulfillment centres around the globe, you can ship your products in bulk to Amazon and they will store your inventory, package it, and ship it when customers order. This allows business owners to not get bogged down with shipping so they can spend more time sorting through other important elements of managing business operations. 

    While Amazon selling is a great way to advertise your products, there are other ways you can utilize the platform to target new customers. Our digital marketing team knows the ins and outs of Amazon selling and would be happy to help you achieve your online sales goals on a budget. 

    Are there any advantages to Amazon selling that we missed? Drop a comment below to share with our readers.

    Performance marketing: What is it and why should you care?

    Posted on by Alex Wilks

    Although many tools facilitate how to plan, track, and optimize digital marketing campaigns, measurable actions are best handled by those who know how to understand the data. Not only does this further the insight on how, when, and where to allocate a business’s spend but it allows businesses to be vigilant on what’s most important. Listed below is our summary of performance marketing and why you should care.

    What is performance marketing? 

    Performance marketing is an umbrella term that’s used to describe any online marketing activity that can be tracked and attributed to a specific action and/or result. 

    There are three main types of performance marketing payment models:

    • Percent of sale: The advertiser pays a commission on each sale generated
    • Leads: The advertiser pays a commission on each sale generated
    • New customers: The advertiser pays a fixed amount for each new customer acquired

    There are also situations where performance marketing models become hybrid and encompass many payment types. 

    Performance-based marketing tactics such as paid—where advertisers only pay when a user clicks on an ad—are not performance marketing. While pay-per-click advertising, also known as PPC, campaigns focus on action—the ad click—they don’t always lead to performance-based outcomes such as sales or sign-ups. 

    Why do businesses care about performance marketing?

    Since performance marketing opens up opportunities beyond traditional marketing, it’s important to focus on web destinations and creators across various digital landscapes. With platforms that help to bridge these relationships by offering means of measuring goals and compensation, businesses can achieve desired results through the assistance of performance marketing. 

    Who uses or works with performance marketing tools?

    Since performance marketing is data-driven, it’s best handled by digital marketing professionals. However, many people can utilize its strategy. 

    • Marketers plan and execute performance-based campaigns
    • Publishers track performance and get paid for results
    • Influencers find opportunities, set goals, and measure performance
    • Advertisers find publishers and influencers to work with

    How reliable is performance marketing? 

    While performance marketing is a critical strategy that offers advertisers the insight they need to run campaigns successfully, digital fraud is something that shoppers, 

    business owners, and advertisers need to be aware of this.

    Why does ad fraud happen?

    • Bots simulate real user traffic on the website to generate ad impressions
    • Invalid traffic is generated by humans who click on ads to deplete a competitor’s budget
    • Fake websites are created to inflate impressions
    • Domain spoofing imitates a premium website to sell fake inventory

    Since performance marketing campaigns look at actions rather than metrics, the best way to ensure validity in the actions you pay for is to hire a professional agency to manage your digital marketing services. This ensures that the leads you pay for are real people who have been contacted and are interested in what you’re selling. 

    What did you find most interesting about the above blog? Please leave a comment below to start a conversation.

    3 digital marketing services that help online businesses boost sales

    Posted on by Alex Wilks

    Regardless of whether you run a small, medium, or large-scale business, you will face competition in an ever-growing market. While your company may be unique in your eyes, there are others that cater to similar wants and needs, which means you’re forced to find ways to stand out. There are many digital marketing services that act as pillars to granting success for online businesses by building brand awareness, leads, sales, and boosts in revenue. Here are three digital marketing tools that you should leverage to boost website conversion within your sector. 

    Email marketing

    While some people might argue that email communication is outdated, rest assured that it’s very alive and well in the world of e-commerce. As the oldest form of electric communication, it remains the most effective way to reach customers, both past and prospective. However, the trick to successful email marketing is to build a list of contacts who are interested in engaging with your brand. 

    Since many entrepreneurs need time to focus on other needs within their businesses, agencies like Trek Marketing offer an email marketing service that is created and managed by a team member. This service includes: 

    • Email strategy and audit
    • Email campaign management
    • Email marketing automation
    • Email template production 
    • Subscriber management and maintenance
    • Creative design and copywriting
    • Deliverability optimization
    • Analysis and reporting of campaign performance

    If you think email marketing is right for you, click here to email a team member and get started. 

    Social media marketing

    With so many channels available to effectively market to your customers, investing in social media marketing is a no-brainer for business owners these days. Also known as SMS, social media marketing utilizes a variety of platforms to interact with customers, including popular options like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. While communication is key to building your brand, SMS also helps to increase sales and drive website conversions and traffic. 

    While posting on social media is easy to do, it’s the strategic posts that successfully reach your growing audience. If you need help expanding your social reach between platforms or figuring out the preferences of your customers, allow Trek Marketing to extend its social media marketing service to you and your business. This package includes: 

    • Proactive customer engagement
    • Targeted follower/like growth
    • Improved search engine rankings 
    • Custom curated content
    • Regular posts and management

    If you think social media marketing is right for you, click here to email a team member and get started. 

    Content creation

    Not only does content allow you to tell web visitors about what your business does but it also allows you to gain a place among other popular search engine rankings. Content marketing can include posting an industry-related topic on your blog or simply updating product and service information to provide quality copy that helps web traffic roll in. 

    Since writing is a skill that requires a lot of time and effort, it’s often the first task that is outsourced to a digital marketing agency. Get the right content in front of your audience by relying on Trek Marketing to do it for you! This service includes: 

    • Taking professional product or service photos
    • Researching and writing blogs
    • Creating landing pages 
    • Updating product and service descriptions
    • Researching search engine keywords and incorporating them successfully into popular landing pages

    If you think content marketing is right for you, click here to email a team member and get started. 

    Which of the above three services would you prefer to outsource? Drop a comment below to share with other readers.

    Boost your brand’s visibility using PPC

    Posted on by Alex Wilks

    While many digital marketing services aim to increase business brand awareness, pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is a unique technique that stares consumers in the eye. Since awareness is about getting your brand in front of the right people, PPC is kind of like the billboard of the digital world, and the best part is that unless the right shopper sees it and clicks, you don’t pay for that campaign. Plus, you can set a daily budget, so there are no hidden costs to run your next PPC advertising service. Continue reading to learn more about PPC and its connection to brand visibility. 

    What is brand awareness and why is it important?

    Brand awareness is a phrase that’s used to describe how recognizable your business is in the noisy online world. It’s the extent to which customers can recall or reconize your brand under a variety of conditions. As a crucial step in the marketing funnel that will help your business acquire and maintain customers, brand awareness is a huge part of what drives consumer decision. Familiarization differentiates your brand, establishes trust with the customer, and creates a positive association which in turn, will increase your sales and conversions.  

    How does our PPC advertising service work to boost your brand’s visibility?

    PPC works to increase brand awareness by introducing your business within ads that your target market sees. This is the space where you can present an introduction of your brand to your customer base and hopefully creating a lasting impression. Whether it’s click-through rates that are important or physical sales, you can analyze your PPC campaign over time and modify your goals as needed. The best part is you only pay for the people that click on your ad and a daily budget can be set. 

    Tips for growing brand visibility using our PPC advertising service

    There are many creative opportunities that come with growing brand awareness, but the ultimate goal is to build a reputation with your target audience that eventually leads to driven sales. This means that strategic decisions need to be made to keep things moving forward. 

    Here are some examples: 

    • Know who your target market is
    • Understand the habits of your target market
    • Diversify your ads
    • Research and use the right keywords and phrases
    • Add a flair of creativity
    • Include the right information 

    Boosting your brand’s visibility is right at your fingertips with our PPC advertising service!

    Do you have any other questions about how PPC advertising works? Please drop a comment below for a prompt reply.

    3 creative ideas that will help you to promote your next virtual event

    Posted on by Alex Wilks

    Effective event communication and promotion are all about creating a strategy that your audience understands and can be involved with. However, it can be challenging to come up with virtual event ideas that offer a unique way of branding and pushing your message out into the world. Aside from a basic call-to-action (CTAs), the three options listed below possess great power to maximize the impact of your promotions, and here’s how.  

    Build a landing page for your virtual event

    Whether the virtual event that you’re hosting is free or ticketed, it’s important to plan to ensure that it gets the attention it deserves. One of the best ways to collect a list of attendees is to create a high converting event landing page where you can place messaging, branded images, graphics, videos, and other necessary information about your virtual event. Not only should this page be clickable and searchable directly from your website, but you can send your customers an email and/or invite them through your social platforms. Reaching out to your target audience is when you use a mix of digital marketing strategies. Plus, landing pages allow you to collect names and emails, along with other information about customers that can be used for segmentation at a later time. 

    Share on community groups

    Word-of-mouth is still one of the most powerful tools for spreading the news about an event. Needless to say, when that event is taking place online, it’s best to use virtual community groups to leverage the right amount of interest. Alongside your branded social media platforms, there are other forums, such as Reddit and Discord, that you can use to promote your event. Excite your target audience by creating posts leading up to the event, and be sure to post images and clips from past event streams to generate added hype.  

    Collaborate with influencers

    You don’t need to be running out of virtual event ideas to utilize the power of social media influencers to promote your brand. Not only do influencers offer business owners the ability to tap into an expanded audience reach, but if chosen strategically, the partnership could offer the business a wide variety of new customers. Be sure to reach out to someone whose profile and experience align with your brand’s area of focus and ensure that your promotion is done on a platform where your potential customers can find you.

    Are you unsure of what to expect from your influencer? Start by introducing your needs and discussing how they can partner with you and what their rates are. Some influencers don’t expect to be paid but may request an exchange of services (ex. Free products to try). 

    Do you know any other virtual event ideas that you believe our followers should try? Drop a comment below to share your knowledge. 

    Is there a future for SMS marketing?

    Posted on by Alex Wilks

    Not only do the majority of shoppers prefer to peruse and purchase via online but many are also making use of their mobile devices to shop, click, and buy. This is one of the reasons that mobile marketing platforms are on the rise, adapting to a more modern way for businesses to engage with their customers. Since most people have access to a smartphone, this marketing technique can and will continue to reach a wider audience with little effort. Here’s how!

    What’s SMS marketing?

    Short Message Service Marketing (SMS marketing) has quickly become one of the most popular marketing techniques. This strategy allows businesses to make use of texting to communicate with their customers by offering updates, reminders, and deals. 

    There are two forms of SMS marketing: One-way communication is when businesses send their updates to the customer without the need for a response, whereas two-way communication is when businesses and customers respond back-and-forth to queries. 

    Key features of SMS marketing

    Online shoppers prefer to handle advertisements at their convenience, which is why SMS marketing campaigns will continue to hold a lot of value for businesses. 

    SMS marketing is:

    • Cost-effective: Similar to email marketing, SMS marketing campaigns are very cost-effective and hold the power to supercharge sales and boost conversion rates among targeted shoppers. This is because customers can unsubscribe at any time, leaving those that remain genuinely interested in the ads.
    • High read rate: Unlike blogs where users need to seek out the material, SMS marketing campaigns are sent directly to the user’s life line… their smartphone. While they may not read your message right away, the notification on their screen will remind them to read it at some point.   
    • Preferred by customers: No one like in-your-face advertising, like the ads you can’t skip over before watching your desired video on YouTube. SMS marketing campaigns keep the interactions quick, efficient, and to the point. 
    • Easy to plan and execute: There is not a lot involved for businesses who want to send SMS messages, making it a good, budget-friendly way for first-time business owners to get the word out about new products or sales. However, there are SMS marketing services that cater to other elements of your campaigns, such as content, design, time of day, etc. often giving the best results due to their knowledge of SMS strategy. 
    • Quick to launch: Unlike email marketing where a template needs to be developed, SMS marketing is easy to set up. All you need to do is import your list of numbers and start planning the messages you want to send. 
    • Analytics offers loads of insight: Since SMS marketing is sent through a direct mobile marketing platform, you can easily track the success of your ads by looking at the deliveries, conversion rates, and responses that are kept recorded in your reports. 

    To answer the question, “Is there a future for SMS marketing”, our response would be, “absolutely!” SMS marketing services are growing because customers prefer to text and businesses can reach their audience within seconds. 

    Are you ready to try out Trek Marketing’s SMS marketing service? Drop a comment below to get in touch with a team member to get started.

    How to use digital marketing to get leads for your real estate business

    Posted on by Alex Wilks

    Not so long ago, online real estate marketing was a nice-to-have asset for real estate professionals. However, times have changed and businesses that don’t invest in their digital portfolios risk falling behind their competitors. As technology continues to govern our lives, our reliance on it will only continue to grow. Thus, the best way to ensure that your leads continue to grow alongside your company is to work with a digital marketing agency that understands how important clicks can be. 

    Take advantage of geo-fencing 

    What’s geo-fencing you ask? It’s a virtual perimeter for a real-world geographic area. This location-based technology allows business owners, in this case, real estate agents and/or companies, to hone in on a target audience based on location. Since a huge majority of prospective home sellers and buyers use their mobile phones to search for real estate, “geo-fencing” is an effective way to deliver relevant messages to the right people. How your campaign works are by precisely targeting a radius around a specific location, which makes it easy for smartphone audiences to find you based on that defined region. The region could be a small neighbourhood or an entire city, and you can also specify types of real estate such as apartments, single-family homes, and office spaces. 

    Build out your SEO strategy 

    While this digital marketing service is best used in a wide variety of industries, real estate marketing greatly benefits from an effective search engine optimization (SEO) strategy. That said, because location is such a key factor in selling something like real estate, local SEO is important when formulating your business goals. For example, it’s essential to rank for local search terms like “best real estate agent” and “homes for sale near me” as these are common phrases that clients type in search consoles to find their ideal agent and/or open houses. 

    Here are some other ways to utilize SEO in your real estate marketing:  

    • Create and optimize a Google Business Profile
    • Regularly write and publish content through that profile
    • Build backlinks from professional and general directories
    • Gain reviews on Google, Facebook, and Yelp

    Social media harnesses huge power 

    When it comes to online selling, social media platforms are a goldmine, especially for those looking to generate real estate leads. This is because many active homebuyers are from the generational group who regularly use social media. So, by leveraging the power of popular channels, your real estate marketing can easily reach the audience that currently dominates the market. 

    Below are some ways we suggest;

    • Research relevant hashtags and use them to optimize your social content
    • Use your accounts to educate buyers
    • Chat with your followers and answer their comments
    • Promote amenities and neighbourhoods, not just the house
    • Share your real estate success stories
    • Consider utilizing video as part of your social strategy

    Real estate marketing is rapidly growing, how are you going to remain relevant in a heavily saturated industry? Drop a comment below to let us know.

    PPC vs. SEO: Which provides more value?

    Posted on by Alex Wilks

    While all digital marketing services have their purpose, there may be a route to take that’s more suited for your business. When it comes to PPC and SEO, more digital marketing services are strategic and possess the power to generate traffic and conversions. That said, before you decide whether one or both is more suited to your needs, you have to understand what they do and their pros and cons. 

    What’s Pay-Per-Click Advertising (PPC)?

    Known most often as PPC, this digital marketing service uses targeted advertising to buy visits to your website. Business owners pay a fee every time someone clicks one of their ads—the cost varies depending on where the ad is placed (Google, Facebook, etc.) and your budgeted monthly ad spend—which is leveraged by search engine traffic or by bidding for keywords related to the products or services you’re selling. 

    What are some advantages of PPC?

    • This digital marketing service is known to produce quick results. Once your campaign is launched, you should see an uptick in traffic, clicks, and conversions. 
    • PPC is easily controlled. Business owners set a budget with a goal of how many leads they hope to get in return. 
    • You don’t need to worry about search engine algorithms when you use PPC because you aren’t trying to obtain an organic position. You bid for your spot!
    • PPC allows you to easily target potential customers based on keyword searches, their geography, and even the time of day. This cannot be done with organic traffic.
    • These types of campaigns allow visuals in addition to text. This can help a user to be more inclined to click on the advertisement, which increases the average click-through rate. 

    What are some disadvantages of PPC? 

    • It usually costs more than SEO to get good results, as some keywords have higher price points than others. 
    • The research required to know which keywords to target is time-consuming, on top of managed ad spend and measuring returns.
    • PPC only remains effective while you’re paying for it. Unlike SEO which continues to draw in traffic as a long-lasting method, the minute you stop your PPC campaigns to divert the budget elsewhere, potential customers won’t be able to find your site the same way. 
    • Click fraud is a problem that occurs when companies use manual clicks or damaging software to simulate human clicks from various IP addresses. This will rapidly increase your cost. 

    The best way to maximize and manage your PPC campaigns is to hire a specialist whose primary responsibility is to research and implement money-generating ads.

    What’s Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?

    As one of the most common digital marketing services, SEO is all about optimizing your web pages to get them to rank higher in search engine results. This enables search spiders to understand your web pages and rank them above your competitors. Keep in mind that search engines like Google are consistently changing their algorithm to provide more helpful content to their visitors, which can affect your rankings if you aren’t on top of these new requirements. While cultivating inbound links from other sites dictates your “link authority” elements like blogging, social media marketing, and videos are other ways to effectively use your quality links. 

    What are some advantages of SEO?

    • This digital marketing service is cost-effective and is incredibly budget-friendly to set up and manage. 
    • Organic SEO is completed with long-lasting intention, meaning that when it’s properly optimized with good link authority, your site can continue to rank even if you step away from it for a few weeks.
    • SEO helps to build credibility and trust.

    What are some disadvantages of SEO?

    • When compared with PPC, SEO is a much slower process, as it can take months to start seeing results.
    • SEO is ongoing. Your site will never be 100% optimized so it will require continued work to reap the rewards of higher rankings.
    • SEO is very time-consuming.

    The best way to maximize and manage your SEO campaigns is to hire a specialist whose primary responsibility is to research trending keywords, write authoritative copy, and gain valuable backlinks.

    There is no one-size-fits-all approach to digital marketing, which is why the answer to the which provides more value depends on you. If you have the budget, a PPC campaign will offer you the fastest results. However, if a longer timeline is something you had in mind, SEO efforts achieve some of the best results and return over time. Either way, Trek Marketing can help get your digital campaigns launched! 

    Which of the two digital marketing services has proven better for your business? Let us know in the comments section below.