A few weeks ago I wrote about using social media in your online marketing plan. This week I shall continue with other vital online marketing tips. So you?ve implemented YouTube, Twitter and or blogs into your online marketing plan, what?s next?

LinkedIn is a fantastic social media platform that is completely business – oriented – it is aimed at users in professional occupations. It is a great tool for networking and referrals and is essential for any B2B company. The Reason it is so successful is due to you being able to connect with many potential clients and partners. Engagement is another highlight for LinkedIn, you can join groups, answer industry questions or even join a discussion on hot business topics. By engaging people you are establishing a relationship and subtly promoting your own business. If you do business with other businesses or professionals, then contributing information, engaging with others on LinkedIn is a fantastic way to build a business relationships that can lead on to deals for your company.

Email newsletters, I?ll be completely honest with you, when I first started at Appletree I didn?t appreciate email newsletters. However after learning how to use email newsletters and how effective they can be, I can confirm that I?m a convert. Email newsletters are a brilliant way of keeping in contact with your clients.  This increases your chances of people referring you to others – and referrals are one of the cheapest and most cost-effective marketing tools there are. Another benefit of newsletters is the opportunity to upsell. A regular newsletter highlighting all your services allows past and current clients to see the range of what you offer, in a non-intrusive way. If you introduce new services or products it?s an ideal way of promoting this to your target market.

If you publish regular newsletters they are really good for SEO too.  Keep them full of useful information, stay away from hard-hitting sales pushes and make them interesting to the reader – it?s not about you, but about them, and why they should read it.  It also makes integrating your marketing really easy too – use your social media tools to promote each edition, with a link to the newsletter which can sit on your website.

The Last aspect of online marketing that I want to talk to you about is arguably the most important one. Your website, your online shop front, what your business offers in a few internet pages. The Questions you need to ask yourself are ?what is the purpose of my website, what do I want it to do?? and ?Does it fulfil its purpose?. By developing your online presence and including links to your website through these marketing tools you will direct more traffic onto your site.  This will increase the chance of more people looking at your services and ultimately bringing you more sales. Using these marketing tools will deliver the traffic; however is your website going to convert potential clients into clients? Your website needs to a have a reason for people to visit it, so I would recommend including a blog, provide people with free useful information, testimonials, include videos and of course include the services your business offers.

Measurement – use a free marketing tool such as Google Analytics.  This will show you how many people are visiting your site, how long for and how they?ve reached your website. It?s a brilliant tool for measuring; it will help you show what is helping bring traffic to the site and what isn?t.

So after reading part 2 of using social media in your online marketing plan you will now have a lot to implement into your marketing plan. As I mentioned in the previous blog, in order for it to be effective, you?re online marketing activity needs to be constant and integrated, keep at it and you will notice the improvement.