Buildex 2012 is one of the largest conventions in the Greater Vancouver Area for the construction and trades industry. Longevity Graphics attended the trade show today to see what company’s are new and upcoming within the industry.
While we were there, we ran into a couple of our clients that we built websites for, do internet marketing for including SEO, and implement social media marketing. Kelli from Timeless Wedding was working a both with a colleague, and Glenn Duxbury from Glenn Duxbury Inspections and Associates.
Our favorite both was The Grounds Guys Landscaping as they had a very cool mascot. Wish I would have thought of catching him on camera. All in all, it was a great day out of the office.
Google Adwords audits are something that we do quite frequently. I run into tons of small businesses that setup their Google Adwords accounts on their own hoping to gain new business leads. The thing that I find most often, is that businesses that setup their own accounts usually make some common mistakes that can cost them big. Their budgets get eaten up and the leads that they receive are not very relevant. Something that I often hear is “Google Adwords doesn’t work!”
Well if you setup your account to target relevant traffic, Google Adwords can be a very cost effect way to increase your business leads and your ROAS (return on as spend). Here are some tips that will help you to improve your campaign.
Tip #1 – Campaign Setup
When setting up your campaigns, it is a good idea to break the campaigns up by geographical region and by the network that you choose to market your ads on. This will help you in the future to allocate more budget to the campaigns that are performing at a higher level, converting, and bringing you more of a return on your ad spend.
Tip #2 – Ad Group Setup
When setting up your ad groups, it is a good practice to setup many ad groups that will incorporate unique targeted keywords. This will allow you to develop targeted keyword rich ad content to display to your audience that is relevant to the search query. Implementing this strategy will increase your chances of a higher click-through-rate which will in turn increase your quality score giving you a better cost-per-click and higher placement than your competitors based on a usability experience.
Tip #3 – Keywords – Broad or Match
When selecting keyword match types for a PPC campaign, it is important to take into consideration many factors; fist and for most, conversion rate, cost-per-click, conversion rate and quality score. Adding broad matches will get you more volume but will cost you more per click. The quality score on the broad match keyword should be lower than an exact match on and hence cost-per-clicks should be higher. You can run a low cost-per-click, high click-through-rate campaign on exacts but your ads will only reach a small audience.
Recommendations for setting up the pay-per-click campaign are to use broad match for longtail keywords and test broad and match types for higher traffic keywords. Since longtail keywords are already very targeted they will receive less traffic and convert at a higher level. However, the higher traffic keywords need to be tested to determine which convert better and have a higher return on ad spend. Once return-on-ad-spend has been determined, we will select the best method for specific keywords.
Tip #4 – Longtail Keyword Strategy
Within the pay-per-click channel, best practice strategies indicate that using more descriptive longer search phrases (longtail) convert at a much higher rate and cost a lot less than broader terms. Using geographical terms matched with broader terms is a great way to create longtail keywords. This is a strategy that we will implement.
Tip #5 – Hire A Professional
If all of this sounds foreign to you, hire a professional to setup your account for you. We setup accounts for clients all the time, and once your account is setup right from the beginning, it’s takes very little time to manage it. If you have already setup your Google Adwords account, we can audit it for you as well.
Twitter may seem like a sea of endless messages of only a 140 characters from millions of users however, if you can use it efficiently and strategically your tweets will be able to stand out. Twitter 101 will teach you the basics of the importance and the basic strategies to get you started on your twitter endeavours.
Twitter is a necessity for any business because it strengthens your brand. A strong brand will immediately draw your audience to your company. With twitter it increases the credibility and awareness of your business which will increase traffic and create new leads. All in all, it is a great tool to show off and promote your business. Although, in order to receive results it is important you are active. Your target audience wants to see that you are just as active as them. If you’re engaging with your audience, the connection will be stronger resulting into potential new clients.
So a few tips and tricks to start you off:
Alright, this seems like a lot of dedication and work for one person to do. Therefore you can hire people to do it for you. This is called Twitter Management. For example, here at Longevity Graphics we offer Twitter Management services. We monitor and maintain your Twitter account while you are free to concentrate on your business. So, don’t be afraid of Twitter, instead take the challenge and use Twitter to create a strong business.
Gaining Facebook Fans
If you build a Facebook Page, will fans come? This is the great hope for many businesses. However, fans do not magically appear from the Facebook mist.
Gaining Valuable Fans vs Fan Count
1. Embed Widgets on Your Website
2. Add to Your Email Signature
3. Facebook Ads
4. Run a contest
5. Link to twitter
6. Display at your store or business to encourage customers to checkin
7. Add a link from your personal profile
8. From time to time it’s okay to link your page from your personal profile with an @ symbol
9. Make a compelling facebook welcome video
10. Upload lots of pictures (make sure to tag these pictures)
11. Load Videos and embed them on your page
Converting Fans into Customers (understanding your fanbase)
Getting More Twitter Followers
Social Media News
Are you always wondering how you can use Facebook to its full potential? Facebook isn’t just a platform for your own personal profile. Sometimes it is very discouraging to see that your company Facebook page doesn’t have the amount of likes, friends or followers you expected. It’s very stressful, but if you use Facebook strategically it will benefit your business.
It is called Facebook Management. For every business you want a strong brand identity. A strong identity means an increase of potential customers and committed followers. Your target audience needs to know that you are just as active as them on Facebook. This creates a bond between you and your audience. So how do you do this exactly? Here’s the thing, if you are a business owner, a very busy one at that, I know for sure you have lots on your mind. The time spent on Facebook could be time worth spending on other business endeavors. That is why businesses usually opt out to hiring externally. For example, here at Longevity Graphics we offer Facebook Management services. We monitor your account, we post relevant news, blog posts and other information, we respond to comments, we design custom Facebook pages, encourage sharing through Facebook and assess your results on Facebook Insights.
So what? Well, the results of Facebook Management not only strengthen your brand identity, it increases your exposure. It increases the traffic that flows to your website. Facebook can guide your target audience to your website, which can provide them with further information and services. It assists with SEO that will enable your business climb to that number one spot for search results. So I suggest reassessing your business and maybe through Facebook Management will be that one push that will accomplish your business objectives.
The Christmas season is fast approaching. Everyone is getting in gear and preparing for the holidays. However, Christmas is the time of year where we also have to think about families and individuals that cannot afford to have a memorable Christmas. We believe by taking time out of our busy schedules and giving back to our community that we can at least brighten up someones day. Here at Longevity Graphics, we have sponsored a family through Share Society. Share Society is a non – profit organization that strives to help families and communities. They have many different programs for residents of the Tri Cities area that do not have the means to access help.
We are making a food hamper, providing clothes, baby diapers and formulas for a family of two. We hope with our help and contribution that it will bring their family closer together. Our goal is to make sure the family can experience a Christmas holiday that once seemed impossible. Aside from helping families in need, we are also helping the homeless in the Tri – Cities area. The Tri – Cities center have very few shelters and food banks for the homeless. Compared to the downtown east side, the Tri Cities are lacking the help they need to assist the homeless. We are taking the initiative to help the homeless in the Tri Cities area by providing toques, gloves, underwear, socks, razors and personal hygiene products.
The Christmas holiday is defiantly going to be a memorable one, not just for us but for everyone that we took the time to help. So, we encourage you to also take the time out of your busy schedule and give a helping hand. With just one simple gesture can impact a family or an individual’s life forever, that can never be replaced.
On a rainy Friday afternoon, I’ve just been recollecting myself and reflecting back on the things that have been going on around at Longevity Graphics. Here at Longevity Graphics is going to get a whole lot busier. Starting November, new project are on the go, new clients are rising and new things to learn and do. I’m excited to see the outcome of all our hard work. Keep in touch to catch up with our progress and the stuff that happens here at Longevity Graphics.
I only work 2 times a week, and it’s been a month and a bit. It’s amazing how much you can learn in just a few days, and I am fortunate to work with Lindsay and treat her as a mentor. I get one on one attention, which is hard to get anywhere else.
So far I’ve been practicing my writing skills by producing content for client’s websites. As an academia writer, it was a change to write in a different tone of voice. I got a lot of tips and critiques to improve upon my writing skills from Lindsay. Learning SEO is something new and something I would never learn at school. Just recently I’ve been getting trained to link build client’s websites, I’ve been using social media in order to get more followers for client’s, created data reports, and gone to meetings.
I look forward to learn more, however, you got to make mistakes in order to learn. So I got to prepare myself for constant feedback and critique.
Longevity graphics would like to introduce Carolyn Dones. She started on September 20th 2011 as the new Marketing Assistant. She goes to school at Simon Fraser University, and studies Communications with a minor in Publishing. She is currently in her last two semesters of Simon Fraser University before she sets off into a new journey to find her dream career.
Why did you choose Communications as your degree?
I was originally studying Kinesiology, hoping to become a Physiotherapist/Kinesiologist for children. However, my life turned a toll when I took my first Communications class. The professor was so intriguing and insightful. I didn’t think I would enjoy learning about how media and culture worked in our society. It definitely opened my eyes to what is going on in our society, and brought me to another level of thinking about our society, intellectually.
What do you hope to achieve with your degree?
With a communication degree it really allows you to do anything. I don’t have a concrete idea, but I would want to get into branding and advertising. Along the same lines, I would love to do marketing. Also, anything that relates to the art industry/scene would be ideal.
What is your favorite commercial?
My favorite commercial would have to be the Knorr’s Sidekicks commercial and their creation of Salty the salt shaker. I felt that the usage of a cute character to show the reduction of sodium within their products. It really appeals to a lot of older and younger viewers.
How do you feel about internet marketing?
Internet Marketing is very convenient in present time. The web has vast amount information, therefore, vast amount of users. I think it’s a really smart idea to use internet marketing, because you have a whole bunch of different platforms from Facebook to Tumblr. People are really connected through the internet. It’s quite fascinating.
Describe your Personality.
Hard worker, dedicated, and easy going
Hobby or Hobbies
I am very interested in design, especially designing logos. I am also a hip hop dancer.
Thanks for visiting our blog! Here we hope to offer valuable advice and insight about our areas of experise, which include internet marketing, web site design and development, and SEO. We welcome your comments and questions.
Longevity Graphics has been helping businesses succeed with internet marketing, web site design and development, and SEO services since 2002. We’ll be posting about developments and trends in these areas, as well as describing the services we offer for our clients, so come back often!