Do you ever feel that there are just too many online marketing strategies out there? Day after day, the men and women who know – the gurus of online marketing – bombard us with new ideas. They have to, of course, because if they don’t, what do they have to sell?  How will they find new customers?

Now, don’t get us wrong, some of these new ideas are definitely worth the good old “college try.” But at the end of the day, it’s important not to lose sight of 3 online marketing strategies that have worked for years – and are working still.

Produce GREAT Content

Great content keeps your website fresh and interesting. Blogs still attract people like almost nothing else – IF they follow two golden rules:

• Blog early and blog often.  It’s not enough to publish a new article every few weeks or even worse, every few months.
• Write content that will interest people and convert them into paying customers.

“Let me tell you all about myself and how remarkable I am. In detail” is visible in too many blogs and whether you like it or not, it turns people off. Today’s consumers are street smart and aware. If you want visitors to become fans and then convert into customers, they have to see your blog as a place where they’ll find content that interests them. So don’t, for example, write a ho-hum blog article about the fabulous deal you’re offering on cruises.  Instead, tell the story of one couple who thought they’d never get to Alaska but did, and the whale they saw, the salmon they ate and the interesting people they met on their trip.

Or, if you’re selling to businesses, vary the pace with the occasional white paper or case study. Tell how Company A cut their operating costs by 20% when they switched to your proactive maintenance package (the one that anticipates likely time-to-fail while also monitoring manufacturers’ recommended parts replacement intervals for the precise mix of equipment they have). Provide a downloadable white paper on the efficiencies that come with increased one-call fixes when field service engineers are provided with mobile software that gives them customer and job history and helps make sure they arrive on-site with the parts and tools they’re likely to need.

These are the types of things that people want to read.  Better still, it will keep them coming back time and time again.

Use Video

Research shows that when someone searches online, answers presented on YouTube, Vimeo and other video platforms get a whopping 35% percent of the clicks. There’s a lesson here and it isn’t hard to see: if you can make a video about your company, your products, your customers or just to illustrate the best way of doing something, then it’s a VERY good idea to make it. And once you’ve put it on your website or your blog, embed it in a tweet, link it to your Facebook page and post the link on LinkedIn. Your video doesn’t have to be long (and, in fact, it probably shouldn’t be).  The fact that it’s there will boost your site and your business.

Take care, though, to have the video optimized for the range of devices it’s likely to be watched on and remember that search engines can’t actually see videos, so you’ll want to make sure you’re properly optimizing it with relevant keywords so that people can actually find it when they search.

Focus on Reputation

Testimonials matter… a lot.  So get some. But DON’T PAY FOR THEM. Consumers know fake reviews when they see them and they’ll hate you for it. Develop strategies to get your customers to post their own instead.

The best way to do that? Ask them!  People like to be asked.  They like to feel that they are useful and that their opinion is valued.

Is it worth the trouble?

You bet it is!  Reputation management has become a booming industry over the past few years. Suppose you have a troublesome molar, you’re far from home and you look online for a dentist. Two names come up. One has ten five star reviews; the other has 5 three star reviews. Which one are you going to choose?  Or perhaps you need an office cleaning company.  When conducting your research, you find that they all have nice websites but one has reviews that say the people there can be relied on to go the extra mile to solve an emergency problem. Which one would you pick?

Servistree can identify the best web marketing strategies for your business and then implement them.  Contact us now – online at Servistree.com or by calling us at 866-944-3244.  Let’s make 2016 the year you leave the competition struggling in your wake!