Most Popular Questions
Digital Marketing Strategy
The main elements of a marketing strategy are your target audience, goals and objectives, and the tactics you will employ to actively market to your target audience and achieve your goal KPIs. These three elements are crucial to formulating an effective marketing strategy.
Whatever the size of your business it is important that you have a marketing strategy in place, to make sure that whatever marketing activity you do, is aligned with your goals and objectives. Having a strategy means you have clear steps to take to meet your objectives whether they are short-term, mid-term, or long-term.
It gives you a clear plan to stick to and something to measure against your results. If you have a plan in place to meet a certain objective, and that objective wasn’t met, then the activity would need to be analyzed to make sure it was the right one for that objective.
Content Marketing
Content marketing is the description given for the creation and distribution of relevant and valuable content to attract a target market to a destination. Content is the collective term used for blogs, articles, infographics, videos, and images. Distribution of content can be on your website and Social Media channels or via third-party channels such as ‘influencers’ blogs, online publishers, and directories.
The job of a content strategist is to understand the ‘big-picture business objectives and develop a content plan which meets these objectives.
Done properly, content marketing is a great way to earn trust and credibility thereby attracting new customers and retaining existing ones. The key to its success is producing relevant, reliable, and consistent content which can be distributed through a variety of channels including blogs, videos, podcasts, social media, and digital publications.
Once you have a fully researched content calendar that meets the business objectives and includes your keywords, good content marketing includes creating original content which is thought-provoking, memorable, and engaging – rich with images and videos.
Firstly you need to establish and define your goals, target audience, and content channels before setting clear and achievable KPIs (so you know what success looks like). You then assess your current position by reviewing all of your content ‘assets’ such as blogs, videos, and images to decide whether you can repurpose or whether you need to create new content. This will enable you to create a content gap analysis and decide which content types will work best. You can then create a content calendar that will plan out your campaign.
Content marketing is all about creating and sharing unique content which people want to see. It entails communicating and getting in front of your prospects and customers without going for the hard sell. A content marketing strategy is simply the master plan for your campaign.
PPC
PPC (pay-per-click) doesn’t have to be expensive if you set up and optimize your campaigns correctly. It’s all about being intelligent with your targeting and keywords and ensuring you’re monitoring performance closely. You can pause campaigns at any point too so if we find a particular search term is becoming too competitive, there’s always the option to stop and review.
We recommend a minimum monthly budget of £500, but this can vary as some industries are more competitive than others, leading to higher average costs per click.
Depending on whether you’re a new advertiser or have an existing account, our PPC services will include an initial audit and research, set up of the account, keyword selection, and creation of ad copy. The ongoing management is based on monitoring and optimizing the account performance, ensuring that it runs as cost-effectively as possible while working towards your KPIs.
One of the main benefits of pay-per-click marketing is that it provides almost instant feedback. Once your ad campaigns are set up and running, they will immediately start driving targeted traffic to your website.
While you can manage your PPC campaigns yourself, having a team of experts or dedicated specialists working on your account can help you get the best level of performance, resulting in a better overall return for your ad spend.
Look for an established company that has Google Partner status – this demonstrates that they have qualified team members, work to an approved standard, and consistently manage a certain level of spend. Ask them about the current and past PPC campaigns they have run, and whether they have any experience working either in your industry or a related one.
A PPC agency either specializes in pay-per-click marketing or offers it as a core service. They will manage your paid search campaigns to help you reach your marketing and sales KPIs, and provide a positive return on your ad spend.
Lead Generation
Lead generation is essential to the growth of any business. Having a strategy in place means that you can keep a steady flow of leads in your sales pipeline.A lead generation strategy will be a comprehensive plan of how you intend to generate leads, outlining your target audience, the channels you will use to reach them, and the tactics you will employ to convert them into leads.
There are many ways to increase sales, even when working with a limited budget. The easiest way is to look at your current customers: can you offer an upsell on your current products or services? Maybe run a promotion or offer for a limited time? The best way to increase sales is to grow the number of leads or customers in your sales funnel. By effectively marketing your business you can increase your number of qualified leads and potential sales.
Assuming you already have a lead generation process in place, the best place to start is a review of your current process. Does it perform well? Are you happy with the quality of leads? Where are the areas it could be improved? Once the process itself has been refined, then you can start working to increase the number of leads in your funnel.
If you have your lead generation strategy and process in place, then it’s time to ramp up your marketing efforts to grow the number of leads in your funnel. Identify your target audience and where you can reach them, plan an effective marketing strategy with clear steps and objectives, then implement your strategy and measure its results.
To market a B2B product or service, first, you need to establish your objectives and goals. What are you trying to achieve? How will you measure this? Then, you must clearly define your target audience. Who are they? What is their position within their company? Are they the ultimate decision maker? Next, you need to form a strategy to reach your target audience. What channels will be most effective? What copy will you use to get your message across? Once you have these fundamental elements in place, then you can begin implementing your strategy.
How you go about generating leads for sales will depend on your business and target market. Define your audience, research the channels that will allow you to reach them effectively, then form a clear strategy with objectives and goals to follow as you market to them.
New leads can come from any area of the business. Soft lead generation can come from keeping your customers happy so that they will refer you, to encouraging people to leave Google reviews to build trust in the digital space, from networking regularly so that your business is known to the target market. Hard lead generation is more strategic and will involve researching businesses, emailing speculatively, or even picking up the phone!Having a clear lead generation strategy and process in place will allow you to generate new leads consistently.
There are many ways of generating leads for your business without having to resort to cold calling. Using digital marketing as an example, you can use search engine marketing to be found by your target audience when they are searching for relevant buying terms, social media to generate brand awareness, and content marketing to create informative and engaging content that both educate your target audience and establishes you as an authority. All of these are effective methods of generating inbound leads.
This is where having a good lead generation, marketing, and sales strategy comes into play. If you can identify the traits that make a lead high-quality to your business, then you can focus your marketing on not only attracting these quality leads but qualifying their quality and what stage of the buying cycle they are currently at.
from the consumer market, who are the end users of the product and services you supply and are using them for personal use. This contrasts with business-to-business (B2B) sales, where the target market will either be businesses or users buying for business needs.
We specialize in using digital marketing techniques to generate leads, both for ourselves and our clients. Using a range of methods, from driving organic traffic from Google to creating engaging content on social media, we can consistently drive targeted traffic that results in high-quality leads.
To generate more B2B leads, you need to define your audience, research the channels that will allow you to reach them effectively, then form a strategy with clear objectives and goals to follow as you market to them. Once you have an effective lead generation strategy and process in place, then it’s time to increase your marketing to grow the number of leads in your funnel.
SEO
Yes! We can work with a wide range of websites, from ones built with static coding to bespoke eCommerce solutions. If your website has a content management system such as WordPress this will make things easier. If not then we can still work with you! Depending on the complexities of your website we will either carry out technical work in-house or suggest liaising with your web developer to implement the changes we recommend.
Unfortunately, no one can guarantee number one or even first page rankings on Google, and you should be wary of anyone who promises otherwise. With constant changes to how it processes and evaluates its results, aiming for a page one ranking on Google can often be a moving target. What you should be looking for is a measurable increase in targeted traffic that drives people actively looking for your products or services to your website. This is what will convert into leads and potential sales, and this is what we focus on for our clients.
SEO is similar to any other form of marketing – what you should spend will always be dependent on your budget, objectives, and what you hope to achieve. The amount you spend will directly correlate with the output of work and the timeframe of expected results.
If you have questions regarding the budget get in touch and one of our experienced team will be able to talk you through the details.
Search engine optimization is a long-term investment, and the time required to see results will depend drastically on both the work required and the competitiveness of your industry. While we always look for quick wins for our clients, you can expect to wait at least 3-6 months to see any significant results from your campaigns, unless your website is already fairly well-established.
Like most things in life, it can be done yourself given time and effort, but if you value your time and the expertise of professionals then it pays to go with a reputable SEO company.
Given a few key metrics such as your conversion rate and average or lifetime sale value, a good SEO agency will be able to forecast your expected ROI based on increases in targeted traffic – this should help you determine whether it is worth it or not.
There is a caveat to this: if a business doesn’t have the budget to afford a reputable SEO company, lacks the infrastructure to deal with an increase in leads and sales, and/or needs results immediately, then working with an SEO company will likely not prove worth it.
A good SEO company will be an established business, with reviews and demonstrable results that show they can deliver what they are proposing. They will be good communicators, and you will be able to contact them without issue.
The right agency for you will listen to your requirements and objectives, then devise an SEO strategy designed to help you achieve your KPIs. They will have experience in your industry or a related field, with past results that prove they are capable of meeting your objectives.
An SEO agency specializes in marketing and promoting companies within the organic (free) results of search engines such as Google and Bing. Based on your requirements and objectives, they will devise a strategy to meet these objectives by optimizing your website so it can be found for terms relevant to your business.
Social Media
You can attract customers on Facebook by maintaining an active social footprint. This involves strategically posting and tactically posting. Your strategic posts should be informational, engaging, and visually appealing. Your tactical posts can be more informal, and fun and feature up-to-date news, and ensure your brand is appealing to your demographic.
Facebook is a great tool for brand awareness to sales. You can use the platform in so many ways. When done well, using Facebook for your business allows you to reach new audiences, generate leads and increase sales. It is fair to say that unless you have a large, engaged customer base already, you will need a combination of organic posts and ad campaigns to boost your business.
You can promote your products organically through your business page or Facebook Advertising. You can also promote your products through positive customer reviews and recommendations and engaging visual content.
Check the charts so you can see who is responding to the ad in the right way. You can narrow or widen your audience if you don’t think you are reaching the right people. To improve your ad make sure you keep a close eye on the targeting until you are getting the desired result.
You can promote your business through Facebook by creating a Business Page. This is easy to do and can be the place that will fly the flag for your business and brand. On this page, you can create events, location pages, offers, and even advertise job vacancies.
Firstly, you will need the Facebook pixel in the backend of your website to track traffic being delivered by Facebook. From there, effectively advertising on Facebook involves paid advertising, establishing a budget, creating a marketing strategy, and learning from Audience Insights.
Allocating a budget to Facebook Advertising can be very worthwhile with an effective strategy set up. With ads, you can reach your target audience by selecting an area, an age range, and even several different spoken languages. You can control who sees your product, which will ultimately boost your website traffic and your conversions.
Social Media Marketing (SMM) is a general term used to describe promoting your business on any of the variety of online channels that enable users to create and share content and participate in conversations in public and private communities. There are hundreds of social media channels to choose from such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube, and Pinterest.
A professional social media marketing agency will devise a cohesive social media strategy and effectively manage and coordinate your social media channels by immersing itself in your brand and building your social media channels to drive an engaged and influential community on your behalf.
Web Design & Development
Generally speaking, and dependent on the technical specification, your website will be launched within six to eight weeks from receipt of a signed purchase order and payment, providing all necessary content and information have been supplied.
We use three different hosting suppliers and will advise accordingly based on the size of your website, the functionality required, and expected traffic.
Yes – most of it. Each website Cariad Marketing creates comes with a CMS (content management system). This means you can edit the text on the pages as often as you like and change things like special offers, photos, prices, etc. You will be given full training on the use of the simple CMS (content management system) and this is included in your website package.
Yes, all of our websites are built with search engine optimization in mind, so your website can easily be found and crawled by Google
Yes, all of the websites we build are fully responsive websites that look great on both desktops and mobile devices.
Digital Marketing
Digital marketing refers to any form of marketing that uses online channels and internet-connected technologies (think computers and smartphones) to target an audience. Given that there are over 44 million daily internet users in the UK alone, digital marketing should be a vital part of the marketing mix for any business.
Yes, digital marketing is one of the most cost-effective forms of marketing available to businesses. Compared to other more traditional forms of marketing it is easier to accurately measure the results of your marketing campaigns, which allows you to make informed decisions about the value it delivers.
A well-planned digital marketing campaign can result in significant returns when implemented effectively, all for a relatively modest investment.
Digital marketing allows you to reach your target audience in ways that traditional forms of marketing do not allow. Depending on the channels used, you can target your market accurately at all stages of the buying cycle, reaching them with highly relevant messaging and content. Digital marketing is also accurately measurable, so you can evaluate precisely where your marketing efforts are having the most impact.
SEM is an acronym for search engine marketing, which is the umbrella term for marketing on search engines like Google and Bing and encompasses both SEO and PPC advertising.
SEO or search engine optimization describes the process of marketing specifically for organic (free) search results.
Search engine optimization (SEO) focuses on promoting a website within the organic (free) search results, to improve its visibility for relevant keywords and terms its target audience use.
Pay-per-click (PPC) marketing serves ads to those same users based on keywords, demographics, or other targeting – but works as an auction-based system where the advertiser is charged per click on their ad.
PPC advertising is available on a variety of online platforms, including search engines such as Google and Bing, and social networks like Facebook and Linkedin.
SMM (social media marketing) is the process of increasing brand awareness and engagement across different social platforms. You build your business persona and market your services or products on each platform.
There are many different types and approaches to digital marketing, each with its advantages. Some of the main types include:
- Search engine optimization (SEO)
- Pay-per-click (PPC) – Google Ads, Bing Advertising, Facebook Ads
- Social media marketing
- Content marketing
- Display advertising
- Native advertising
