Category: Uncategorized

Is it actually important for writers to understand SEO?

In a word, yes.

With a majority of marketing budgets being devoted these days to digital marketing, Search Engine Optimization is crucial for staying relevant and competitive.

As an essential member of a marketing team, you can work with web developers, strategists and others to improve your team’s chances of getting discovered by search engines and reaching a wider audience.

While some aspects of SEO are the domain of web experts and not necessary for you to understand in detail, other SEO factors are best left to writers like you. Understanding these essentials will help you create more engaging and relevant content that is more likely to get noticed by people you’re trying to reach.

Here’s a quick summary of what you need to know.

What SEO is

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. It is the process of improving the quality and quantity of website traffic to a website or a web page from search engines, and target unpaid rather than direct or paid traffic. Ultimately, SEO is about making your website more visible in search engine results pages (SERPs).

How it works

Search engines use algorithms to crawl and index websites. When someone searches for a keyword or phrase, the search engine will return a list of results that are relevant to the search query. The higher a website ranks in the search results, the more likely it is to be visited by users.

Why use it

SEO can yield a number of benefits, including increased website traffic, improved brand awareness, higher conversion rates, increased sales and improved customer satisfaction – basically, the key outcomes most marketing teams are looking for.

How writers can help

There are several ways that you as a writer can improve your website’s SEO, such as creating high-quality content, using relevant keywords and building hierarchies into web structure. Many of these activities involve collaboration with other members of the marketing team in order to capitalize on everyone’s strength and knowledge.

What else you should know

SEO is a complex and evolving field. It’s also an ongoing process that requires time and effort. However, by following best practices, you and your team can help ensure that your online marketing goals are met, driving company success.

Featured image above by Vecteezy

Sources

1. locvolawmares.tk/ 
2. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_engine_opt

In a meeting recently, when someone brought up the topic of search engine optimization, a seasoned writer and editor rolled his eyes, groaning about SEO guidelines that he didn’t seem keen to comply with.

Hey, I get it. As a writer myself, I understand that most writers don’t want webmasters telling them what to do any more than developers want writers telling them what to do.

But the thing is, Google and other search engines are the primary way that people, including writers, navigate the internet. If you want to rank higher in search engine results pages (SERPs), which should improve the marketing efforts that you’re an essential part of, there are ways to write for both people and search engines that you can be happy about. Here are some tips.

Write high-quality content.

Before you worry about keywords and other SEO strategies, start by crafting text that is informative, engaging and relevant to your target audience. Search engines are getting better at understanding quality, which will help to ensure that your valuable content gets the attention it deserves.

Use keywords strategically.

Keywords are the words and phrases that people are searching for online. When you use relevant keywords throughout your content, you’re making it more likely that your content will show up in search results.

However, you don’t have to overdo it. If you use too many keywords, your content will look spammy and you’ll be penalized by search engines. Keep in mind that excerpts and metadata can also help optimize content without affecting your prose, as long as the summary adequately represents what’s on the page itself.

Add a call to action.

CTAs are not just for campaign pages. Even in a news article, you can tell your readers what you want them to do next, whether it’s signing up for your email list, sharing your content on social media or registering for an event. These days, readers are used to being invited to do something as a result of reading an article, so it’s OK to give them the opportunity.

Optimize your website for search engines.

Writers and editors are integral parts of web redesign teams. When working alongside developers, be sure to consider best practices like a clear and concise website structure, relevant title tags and meta descriptions, and mobile-friendly design. Likewise, if you’re responsible for uploading your stories to a company site, be sure to include strong, descriptive headlines; subheads that establish hierarchy of content; high-quality photos and videos; and keywords embedded into the metadata.

Build backlinks to your website.

Backlinks are links from other websites to your website. The more backlinks you have, the higher your website will rank in search results. There are a number of ways to build backlinks, such as guest blogging, submitting your website to directories, participating in online forums and working to get company leaders quoted in the media.

Promote your content on social media.

Social media is a great way to drive traffic to your website. Share your content on your profiles and engage with your followers. Even if you’re not in charge of social on the job, you can write posts in the company’s voice to hand over to social media managers.

Featured image above: Photo by Edho Pratama on Unsplash

Source: fastergrowths.com/what-are-the-4-types

Before the advent of CRM software, customer relationship management was a much more manual and time-consuming process. Businesses often relied on paper-based systems, such as filing cabinets and Rolodexes, to keep track of customer information. Sales teams would have to manually track interactions and enter data into spreadsheets without easily being able to share updates in real time, leading to missed sales opportunities.

Today, CRM software has made it much easier for organizations from corporations to foundations to universities to manage relationships by providing a centralized database for customer information and automating many processes involved in customer interactions.

As a marketing professional, you may be tasked with working with your sales, development or admissions department to connect marketing campaigns with CRM software. Here are some essential things to know.

Understanding CRM software

Customer relationship management platforms provide a centralized database for customer information, which can be accessed by different teams and departments within a business. The database allows businesses to keep track of customer interactions across multiple channels, such as email, phone and social media, in one place.

The software also automates many of the processes involved in tracking customer interactions, such as logging calls and emails, scheduling follow-up tasks and creating reports. This makes it easier for businesses to provide personalized service to customers, as well as to identify opportunities for cross-selling and upselling.

Additionally, many CRM software solutions also offer features such as marketing automation and analytics, which can help businesses better understand their customers and improve their overall experience. Finally, many offer additional tools such as templates for sophisticated newsletters, which can drive calls to action.

Advantages

CRM software offers several advantages over traditional paper or spreadsheet solutions. They include:

1. Centralized customer data: With all customer data in place, every team get a complete picture of each customer and their interactions with the business across different channels.
2. Improved customer service: Knowing the customer’s complete history heps team members quickly respond to customer queries and provide tailored solutions to meet their needs.
3. Automation of manual tasks: By automating many of the manual tasks involved in tracking customer interactions, such as logging calls and emails, scheduling follow-up tasks and creating reports. sales and customer service teams have more time to focus on building relationships.
4. Increased sales: CRM software helps to identify opportunities for cross-selling and upselling, as well as to track leads and sales opportunities, which can led to increased revenue.
5. Better analytics and reporting: With features such as marketing automation and analytics, businesses can better understand their customers and improve their overall customer experience. Data also provides benchmarking for enhanced decision-making.

Disadvantages

Some of the disadvantages of using CRM software for businesses are:

1. Cost: Implementing CRM software can be expensive, especially for smaller businesses. They may need to invest in hardware, software licenses and training to ensure that they can use the software effectively.
2. Complexity: CRM software can be complex and difficult to use, especially for those who are not familiar with the system. This steep learning curve can cause a temporary drop in productivity while users are still trying to get to accustomed to the software.
3. Integration: Integrating CRM software with other systems and applications can be challenging, especially if the software is not compatible with existing systems. This can lead to data silos and a lack of integration between different departments and teams.
4. Campaign coordination: When planning a campaign, it’s great to link calls-to-action to CRM software, which can automate follow-up messages. But this level of sophistication requires deep coordination with multiple business units, which need to make decisions such as who will monitor the database to track progress and who will be assigned to follow up personally with high-value prospects.
5. Maintenance: CRM software can be time-consuming and costly, requiring updates and maintenance to ensure that it’s running smoothly and that data is being stored and accessed correctly.
6. Data security: CRM software contains sensitive customer data, which makes it a target for cyber attacks. Businesses need to ensure that their CRM software is secure and that customer data is protected from unauthorized access.

Digging deeper

Now that you better understand CRM software, read on to discover how to effectively implement customer relationship management programs.

Featured image above by Vecteezy

In today’s competitive marketplace, customers – whether they’re shoppers, college students, donors or the like – have more choices than ever before. If you want to succeed, you need to provide a superior customer experience. CRM can help you to do just that.

Customer relationship management (CRM) involves managing all aspects of a company’s interactions with its customers, from marketing and sales to customer service and support.

When you treat your customers well, they are more likely to buy from and remain loyal to you, which helps your business grow and succeed. Here are five keys to doing it right.

• Customer identification and targeting: Who are your customers? What are their needs and wants? What are their pain points? Once you understand them, you can develop strategies to meet and event exceed their expectations.
• Customer data management: Accurate and current data is essential to managing customer relationships. By using CRM software to collate data points about your customers, you can better target marketing campaigns, improve customer service, and identify new product or service opportunities.
• Communication: Businesses need to communicate with customers regularly and through multiple channels to build strong relationships and provide excellent customer service. With the help of CRM platforms, your employees can automate some of these interactions to ensure prompt and regular communication.
• Collaboration: Working in cross-functional teams helps to ensure a seamless customer experience. Depending on the nature of your business, your marketing team may need to work with sales, development, admissions and/or customer service folks.
• Continuous improvement: CRM is an ongoing process. It’s important to regularly evaluate your CRM processes and systems and make changes to improve customer satisfaction and loyalty.

By focusing on these key factors, you can build successful CRM programs that improve customer satisfaction, increase customer loyalty, and ultimately drive revenue growth.

Featured image above: Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦 on Unsplash

When it comes to social media content, variety is the spice of life. Mixing up the types of content you’re offering allows you to cater to the different interests of your audiences. Variations in content also keep your feed engaging and fresh, enticing your followers to return again and again for all the interesting news you have to share.

Photography

Photos are some of the most valuable types of social media content, and some of the most frequently posted. That’s because they can be easily absorbed and give viewers a quick view of your brand.

Research shows that photos of people resonate more than photos of objects, and photos of people looking directly at the camera perform better than images of the subject looking away from the camera. But those are not hard and fast rules. Read up on trends in your industry, and check social feeds for industry leaders to see what their followers are responding to.

You can also experiment with what I call the “Netflix Effect” – trying different images at different points in time without changing the text of the post to see what performs best.

Graphics

Graphics that incorporate your company’s identity can help reinforce brand messaging on social media. However, be careful that you’re not over-branding your posts; some users may find too much branding inauthentic, and your social feed will look dull and static if every graphic looks like the next one.

Blog posts 

Blog posts hosted on your site will help establish your expertise and provide value to your audience. Sharing these posts on social media will drive more viewers to your site. They’re also a force multiplier, allowing you to leverage content created for one platform on another.

Infographics

Infographics present complex information, data or statistics in a clear and concise way. Because they are designed to be easy to understand and visually appealing, they are ideal for sharing on social media platforms. Infographics can be shared as stand-alone images or incorporated into larger posts or articles. Be sure to include text in your post as well for accessibility.

Videos

Videos help create emotional connections with your audience and supersize your social media efforts by helping to generate more interactions and shares. They can range from simple to complex, from short reels created with still photos to organic phone content to highly-produced videos. Topics can include customer testimonials, product demos, event recaps, staff interviews and more.   

User-generated content

Content created by or involving your customers helps to humanize your brand while instilling a sense of community and encouraging engagement. Encourage users to tag your business during events you’re hosting. Sponsor photo contests, offering a small prize for the top images. Post customer reviews and testimonials to build credibility. 

Polls and surveys

Ask your audience to participate in polls or surveys to gather feedback and insights. This free version of market research, while maybe not the most rigorous, will yield valuable insights into your followers’ preferences and desires.

Live streams

Host live streams to interact with your audience in real-time and answer their questions. The upsides are numerous: building community, showcasing the benefits of your products and services, enhancing engagement and building brand recognition.

Quote graphics

Motivate and inspire your audience with inspirational quotes. Whenever possible, quote people associated with your company, such as a founder or president, or a person from history whose values align with your company’s.

In lieu of quotes, consider breaking down your mission statement into a series of posts. Whatever approach you take, be sure to incorporate a graphic that includes a photo of the person being quoted, an aesthetic photo from your company’s stock images or brand elements such as illustrations or icons.

Helpful content

How-to guides posted on website and shared on social media provide value to your audience and help establish your expertise. Depending on the platform, you can either share the entire story or just bullet points with a link to a longer article on your website. Remember to keep your content engaging, relevant and aligned with your brand messaging to maximize its impact.

Featured image above: Photo by Merakist for Unsplash

Ready to level up your marketing efforts? If you’re managing a team, get help from project management software.

By providing a centralized platform for collaboration, task management and resource allocation, PM platforms can greatly enhance efficiency and effectiveness, reducing headaches and allowing your team to achieve its goals with greater ease and confidence. Depending on the product, features include automated notifications, customizable workflows, real-time updates, robust reporting and analytics, and process optimization.

Here are some of the most popular project management brands available today:

• Asana: This web and mobile-based project management software helps teams track their work, manage deadlines and collaborate effectively. It’s a popular choice for businesses of all sizes, and is known for its ease of use and versatility, including the ability to check progress online, on a computer app and on your phone.
• Basecamp: Not ready to ascend the mountaintop? Like the name implies, Basecamp is designed to be simple and easy to use. The web-based project management software is considered a good choice for small businesses and teams looking for a basic solution.
• Celoxis: A comprehensive project management platform, Celoxis is designed for enterprise-level businesses. It’s known as a powerful tool for managing complex projects with multiple stakeholders.
• Jira: Designed for software development teams, Jira is a popular, powerful tool that helps you track bugs, manage tasks and release software.
• Monday.com: With a name that’s much more relatable than its original daPulse moniker, Monday.com is a web-based project management software known for its intuitive interface and customizable features. It’s considered a good choice for businesses of all sizes, and it’s particularly popular with creative teams.
• ProofHub: For a simple and affordable solution, ProofHub is a web-based project management tool designed to help teams collaborate effectively.
• Smartsheet: Sometimes referred to as Excel and Access on steroids, Smartsheet is, as the name implies, a spreadsheet-based project management software. Considered a good choice for businesses that are steeped in spreadsheet culture, this powerful tool can be used to manage projects of all sizes.
• Trello: For visual folks like web designers, Trello is known for its Kanban boards – graphical representations that allow team members to see the status of every project at any time. The web-based product is considered a good choice for businesses looking for a visual and easy-to-use solution.

Featured image above from Rawpixel

My husband, a licensed marriage and family therapist, says that people don’t change when they’re comfortable. It’s only when they become uncomfortable that they’re willing to do the hard work to make changes for the better. 

With that in mind, what’s bothering you about your project management today? Missed deadlines? Poor communication? Low morale and productivity? 

You’ve likely experienced a number of other pain points as well. Thankfully, most of these headaches can be minimized with the help of project management software.

Maybe you’ve been reluctant to invest in a project management platform because of concerns over cost or time lost during the adoption phase. Admittedly, if your marketing team has never used PM software, it can be a steep learning curve. But here’s why it can be worth the squeeze. 

The upside

Improved planning and scheduling: With PM software, you can create and manage detailed project plans, including timelines, milestones and task dependencies. This granular view helps you identify potential risks and roadblocks early on, helping to ensure that projects are completed on time and within budget. You can also visualize everyone’s workloads, making it easier to schedule realistic deadlines.

Reduced risk of scope creep: It’s an all-too-common occurrence: an internal or external client requests your team’s marketing assistance, and everything is on track for a timely delivery. Then, a few weeks later, the client requests additional tasks out of the blue. While PM platforms don’t prevent scope creep altogether, they do allow you to set up templates for common projects; functioning as checklists, the templates help you and your partners consider a variety of options at project launch when deadlines and budgets are being set.

Better collaboration and communication: Having a central platform for all project stakeholders to collaborate and communicate effectively reduces misunderstandings and delays. When everyone is literally on the same page, employee and client satisfaction is likely to increase.

Increased productivity: With PM software, you can streamline workflows and automate many of the tasks involved in managing similar types of projects. This can free up your time to focus on more strategic work, improving your overall output.

Better visibility and accountability: Are you tired of spending hours in team meetings or sending endless emails to catch up on everyone’s workload? Project management software can help you track progress in real-time. By holding people responsible for keeping their project boards updated, you create transparency and accountability within your team.

Easier file access and sharing: Most businesses have multiple options for storing files, which creates confusion when searching for documents. With PM software, working files and final files can be stored within each project, making them easier to access later.

Data-driven decision-making: Whether it’s missed deadlines, budget overruns or inequities in workload, project management software helps you analyze and identify problem areas. Once you determine the remedies, you can return to the platform later to track your progress.

The downside

As with all digital tools, project management platforms are not fool-proof. The software can be complicated, and employees will need training, patience and reassurance to embrace it.

Additionally, if you’re using PM software primarily for your own team, then clients, even internal ones, will not have access. That can be good if you want to track challenges your team is encountering that you’re not ready to share with clients. But it also means you have to use alternative forms of communication to keep decision makers apprised of your progress, which adds a layer of complication.

Finally, PM platforms are big on notifications, from in-software alerts to emails. If you’re managing a lot of projects, you will likely get an avalanche of notifications. In that case, consider turning off email notifications except for critical alerts, and make a habit of checking the PM platform routinely throughout each day to ensure that communications don’t get lost in the shuffle.

Featured image above: Shutterstock photo