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Online Marketing
Top 13 Reasons Why You Need to Incorporate Video Marketing to Promote Your Business
Before, business owners and marketers shy away from using videos because they take a long time to make and required special software.
Nowadays, there are a lot of sites and software with editing tools that can be used for free. Some also include free effects and transitions to make your videos more fluid and attractive to viewers.
Videos can be informative as well as entertaining. As long as you’ve made videos that effectively represent your brand or business, your products or services will sell out quickly.
If you haven’t started using videos yet, here are 13 points to explain the importance of video marketing for your business.
1. Builds Trust with Your Audience
Trust makes conversions and sales happen. The concept of content marketing is not about selling but creating long-term relationships. Once you’ve established trust, people will come to you not just for information but for the products or services you’re offering.
When you’re in a brick and mortar store, it’s easier to build trust with customers through personal interaction. It’s quite difficult when you have an online store. Some costumers are still skeptical about making online purchases because of fraud and scams.
Build trust with your prospects first by introducing your brand or company through a video. Put up how-to videos or content-filled to keep your audience engaged. Once your audience understands and remembers your brand, you can publish videos promoting your products or services.
2. Explains Products or Services Effectively
A video can explain a variety of topics easily. It can show steps on how to use a newly launched product or discuss in detail how a new service is fulfilled and who are involved in the process.
Always remember to make videos with the intention to keep your audience engaged. When making a video, focus on one topic only. Throw in questions to trigger curiosity and include references for further reading. Inject some humor to excite your audience and avoid long texts and talking nonstop.
Want to simplify a complicated service? Show the process through an animated video. Live demonstration can work but animations are more fun and engaging. This way, customers remember your brand and recall more information about your products or services.
3. Gets More Social Shares and Web Traffic
Social media platforms have revolutionized from still pictures to moving ones. In fact, videos are found to generate 1200% more shares compared to text and images on social media.
The sharing potential offered by video marketing can effectively multiply your visibility and help you reach the audience you’re looking for. And given that your video will reach your potential consumers organically, the impact will be higher.
This is why video marketing is so powerful. It can capture a wide audience that will continue to share your video until it reaches your desired audience. Make sure to also use your website as landing page to increase traffic into it.
4. Boosts Your Conversions and Sales
There’s no denying the fact that online marketing can help you make money but some strategies don’t make sales as high as video marketing. If you know how to do video marketing properly, it will increase conversions and lead to sales.
Videos are visually pleasing and can trigger a variety of emotions. With a product or explainer video, you can build a connection with your audience. Once you’ve earned their interest and trust, your audience becomes customers.
5. Engages with Mobile Users
Mobile phones or smartphones are not only used for communication but also for entertainment or just to pass the time. In fact, people are getting obsessed with smartphones that they spend breaks burying their faces on mobile screens.
A big chunk of these mobile users also watch videos through mobile. The increase in mobile usage and video streaming is so dramatic that social media platforms like Youtube and Facebook incorporated ads into videos.
As the number of smartphone users grow, so as your video audience. Having a wide audience doesn’t guarantee conversions or sales though. An enticing video content still plays a big role in making your viewers consume what you’re offering.
6. Engage All Types of Audience
Even then, ads are usually short and straight to the point. Will you read a 300-word billboard ad or a lengthy facebook post without an image? I guess not. Your audience is a mix of the busiest, the laziest and everyone in between. Make sure your video content will engage a majority of your audience, especially the laziest ones. Consumers already know what they want, all you have to do is make them take action.
7. Viewers Want More Videos
We are living in the golden age of videos. They are so accessible that people just scroll through social media, find a random video and get sucked into a black hole where they end up watching video after video.
Information hunting has become easier as well because of videos. Customers are watching more videos to find products and make purchasing decisions. For example, you want to remove hard stains from your bathroom walls; you can easily find a demo video in YouTube that also includes recommendation for tools and products.
You don’t have to convince your audience to watch your videos. Just put your videos out, add relevant tags or interests, and your audience will do the rest. People want things to be comprehensive and videos can achieve that.
8. Search Engines and Social Media Love Videos
Videos drive organic traffic into your site and increase the time spent by visitors. An effective way to do this is by uploading your videos through YouTube and sharing them in your social media accounts.
YouTube is owned by Google which means all videos uploaded into it are also tracked by Google. It also affects your site’s search ranking so the more relevant and optimized the videos are, the higher the search engine rank.
People also love watching random videos on social media and they share anything they find entertaining. A fun video post that includes a link to your website will convert into website clicks which can potentially turn visitors into customers. Give potential customers the way to take the next step.
9. Rank High in YouTube
Information hunting is not only done through search engines like Google, you can also do it through YouTube. People use YouTube to search for educational or demo videos.
How-to videos in YouTube can teach anyone, anything from simple hacks to complicated web programming. A study shows that searches for how-to videos went up 70% in the last couple of years.
10. Get Unbelievable ROI
Return on investment (ROI) is the ratio of profit made in a financial year as a percentage of an investment. Entrepreneurs use it to see if their investment on a business is successful or not.
Although high quality video production involves a lot of money and time, it also produces a big payoff. 52% of business owners state that video marketing gives the greatest ROI in marketing so you’re assured that you’re putting your buck at the right place.
If you’re a start up or you don’t have the resources yet, you can use a smartphone or point-and-shoot camera to take videos and edit them using free editing tools. You can then upgrade to high quality or even animated ones when you have the funds. As mentioned earlier, video content matters more than aesthetics so get that all polished first before going for the upgrade.
11. Ads in Videos Work Wonders
Video ads are rocking social media platforms. Facebook learned that 74% of the total Ad Recall (the number of people that remember the ad) can be achieved within the first 10 seconds. So long as you’ve made sure your video is fun and engaging especially on the first 10 seconds, people will remember you, watch till the end or make the purchase. That right there is the importance of video marketing for your business.
12. Upgrade Your Email Marketing
Let’s be honest, emails can get boring and are not convincing enough. Why not incorporate your videos into your emails? Adding a video into your email can increase your click through rate by a whooping 96%. More clicks mean more conversion and more conversion increases sales.
13. Maximize and Recycle
Creating videos can be costly and time-consuming that’s why you have to find other ways to use them. How do you do that? For example, you want to repurpose your existing videos for other video marketing strategies. You can post an announcement on social media that you will do a talk about it and an episode or video will be posted at certain intervals and your audience can comment their questions for further discussion.
Video clips can also be turned into GIFs and teaser videos that you can use in other marketing strategies. You can use a GIF on a new social media post and a teaser video to promote a blog post or landing page.
Video marketing is proven to be one of the best marketing strategies. With the increase in demand for videos, you may eventually find it difficult to keep up with it.
Don’t miss out on a great business opportunity; don’t let go of video marketing. If you’re too busy, you can hire for technical virtual assistant. Let an expert video marketer bring in more conversions and sales while you reap the benefits of video marketing for business.
Looking for virtual staffing agencies or have questions about virtual assistant services? CALL US at 1-866-596-9041 and see how our highly qualified and trained VAs can assist in your everyday tasks and objectives.
We would love to hear if these tips worked for you! If you have questions or any Content Marketing related success stories, please leave a comment below.
References:
Yumyumvideos.com
Tarproductions.com
Business2community.com
Ngdata.com
Strategiccfo.com
Last Updated: August 30, 2018
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Top 17 Resources for Creating Blog Posts Ideas for Any Type of Business
An average person spends up to 8 hours per day on the internet. Because people have become more engaged online, most if not all businesses put up a website or blog page to keep customers updated.
Posting or sharing random stuff online is not enough though. If you run out of marketing blog topic ideas that are also engaging for your customers, this list may become your go-to tools for blog topic generation.
Look for relevant keywords
1. Google Keyword Tool
Image from: smallbiztrends.com
Google AdWords houses a free keyword tool you can use to check for keywords that people search for everyday. It will show you a list of keywords with their corresponding statistics so you can choose which ones are trending and highly relevant to your business.
2. SEO Book Keyword Tool
Another great blogging resource is the Keyword Suggestion Tool at SEO Book. If you have a broad topic in mind and would like to get more specific, this tool can suggest narrowed down topics, which can help optimize and rank your blog or site.
3. Google Suggested Search
Google’s Suggested Search usually appears at the bottom of a search results page after you enter a keyword at the search bar. The list of suggested terms usually contains the actual keyword or is related to it.
Use blog title or headline generators
If you already have a keyword but can’t muster a catchy blog title, you need the help of a title generator. It works by keying your keyword in and the tool will suggest actual and sample titles based on popular blog posts. It’s best to use these suggestions only as a starting point to write your unique and catchy title.
Here are some of the best tools for blog title ideas:
4. tweakyourbiz.com/title-generator
5. hubspot.com/blog-topic-generator
6. portent.com/tools/title-maker/
7. prozely.com.au/tools/blog-title-generator/
8. inboundnow.com/apps/kill-writers-block/
9. contentrow.com/tools/link-bait-title-generator
Find out what’s hot and what’s not
10. Pinterest
Image from: smallbiztrends.com
Sometimes, words aren’t enough to spark an idea. Why not get unique blog ideas from a unique and visually stimulating platform? Pinterest is a social media site where users post and share images and interests. You can create various boards where you can share your own photo or “pin” another user’s post. These boards work like general ideas and the pins serve as the specific topics you can get inspiration from.
11. Twitter Keywords
If you’re into what’s hot in the social media world, Twitter is where you can get trending blog content ideas. Know what’s trending by checking hashtags and popular articles. To look for a specific topic, search for your keyword and check out the most popular “tweets.”
12. LinkedIn Groups
LinkedIn is also a popular social network that can be added to your arsenal of useful blog topic resources. Search for LI groups by entering your keyword and choosing groups that are popular and relevant to your target. Some groups are public so you can easily look into their discussion while others may require you to join first. Either way, these groups are very useful resources for blog topic generation.
13. BuzzSumo
Get the buzzing topics across all social media sites when you use BuzzSumo. It’s like a one-stop shop for what to blog about. Just key in your keywords and BuzzSumo will list down articles and the number of total shares on all sites (Google, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn and Facebook).
Draw insight from articles and news
14. Feedly
Feedly is the world’s most popular blog and RSS reader which helps you keep up with all the topics that matter to you. It’s one of the best and free blogging resources that let you organise news, your favorite blogs and articles all in one place.
15. Alltop
With Alltop, you can easily find relevant post titles and trending stories by searching for your topics and browsing through headlines under each topic.
16. Google News
Image from: smallbiztrends.com
Another great content idea generator is Google News. It offers a wide range of news and articles on any topic. Use specific keywords to generate news results relevant to your interest or business. To get to Google News, go to Google.com, key in your keyword and click the News link tab.
17. Quora
A blog is usually written to provide answer to a question or discuss solution to a problem. Quora is a special blog idea generator that lists questions related to different niches and businesses. You can also find great varying responses or solutions which you can discuss further in your blog.
Content marketing plays a significant role in growing a business nowadays. These blogging tips are just the first step to drive traffic to your blog or site. More traffic means more sales but don’t worry if you’ve got a full schedule, you can entrust your blog to a virtual assistance company.
Continue to engage your customers with content-filled posts and grow your business to its full potential without compromising time and quality. Having a blog management virtual assistant is the next step you can take to achieve success in blog and business.
Do you have any questions about virtual assistant services? CALL US at 1-866-596-9041 and see how our highly qualified and trained VAs can assist in your everyday tasks and objectives.
We would love to hear if these tips worked for you! If you have questions or any Content Marketing related success stories, please leave a comment below.
References:
smallbiztrends.com
digitalrhinos.com
prozely.com.au
Last Updated: August 2, 2018
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Top 30 Real Estate Marketing Apps That Will Revolutionize Your Business To The Next Level
Top 30 Real Estate Agent Tools to Boost Your Business in 2020
1. Refresh
Refresh mobile app can be very helpful for you to keep track on who’s who with your everyday interactions. It allows you to connect everything from your social networks, contacts, calendar to give you insights before each meeting.
How it works:
- Refresh is one of the top real estate apps for agents if you want to know more about someone.
- You can search their name to locate background info across multiple social media profiles.
2. Zillow Premier Agent
Zillow is a lead generation app used widely by real estate professionals making it by far the largest real estate website in the USA. It is said that In order to be competitive, you NEED to be on Zillow. It’s the go-to resource for more than 70 million buyers and sellers each month.
Image from: fitsmallbusiness.com
How it works:
- You can submit new rental and sales listings.
- You can also “claim” listings you created that were uploaded to Zillow straight from your MLS.
- When a buyer encounters your listing from Zillow or Trulia, you have a much greater chance of receiving their inquiry since your name appears exclusively on your listings.
A virtual assistant for real estate can also market your properties in Zillow, among other online listing sites like Craigslist, Backpage, Kijiji.
3. QCards
This real estate software creates and mails marketing postcards right from your iPhone or iPad to help you attract more leads and local listing opportunities.
How it works:
- Use photos and select contacts from your phone, or let QCards generate a nearby mailing list for you.
4. RPR Mobile
Image from: rprblog
RPR Mobile delivers the data and reporting found on the RPR website, directly to your phone. It is one of the best apps for realtors, as the system is 100% covered by your NAR member dues.
How it works:
- Realtors can use their location to search both on and off market properties, while also knowing:
- Mortgage
- Historical and distressed data
- Flood zones
- school info and more
- You can then create one of 5 different property and neighborhood reports, each branded with your photo, logo and contact details.
5. Contactually
This is a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) app that helps you manage your relationships, your contacts and leads.
How it works:
- Automated follow up reminders.
- Advanced automation and pipeline management.
- A letter grade to tell you how well you’re doing with your follow up.
6. Animoto
Animoto is highly popular among real estate agents who always aim to provide superb presentation of their properties. The great thing is that you can right from your smartphone.
How it works:
- Create high-quality, HD video slideshows on mobile or the web version.
- Background music is provided.
This app will help your marketing stand out – be sure to hire virtual staff to make all your presentations professional and more appealing.
7. Vert
This handy app makes conversions simple – basic version is free, and Pro is $2.99.
How it works:
- Tap on the measurement and then swipe to convert metrics, such as size, weight, length, or currency.
8. Placester
This one is an IDX Website Builder for real estate. Placester uses WordPress, and you can get a fully featured website from it for as low as $69/year.
Image from: fitsmallbusiness.com
How it works:
- Placester pulls listing data from your MLS, so your visitors can search for properties on your site.
If you’re looking a properly maintained website where you can customize step-by-step, a web designer real estate assistant can create one for you by following your desired specifics.
9. Open Home Pro
This app is a top choice among agents for open houses and broker opens – you can manage the contact info of your walk-ins!
How it works:
- Select contact options and automatically follow up with new leads in your next marketing campaign.
10. Scannable
Scannable is the newest app from Evernote, and makes saving and sharing scans easy.
How it works:
- This app immediately identifies business cards, receipts, and other paper items it’s pointed at. So just aim the camera and it will detect the document edges and then capture it.
11. DocuSign
DocuSign is the world’s most trusted Electronic Signature/Transaction Management software. It offers the best platform for getting documents signed and deals tamed.
How it works:
- Agents can keep track of all documents in a transaction from agency disclosure to contracts.
- Brokers can set up advanced approval processes and workflows to be as hands off, or hands on.
12. Hootsuite
Hootsuite social media publisher allows you to manage all of your social network accounts in one spot.
How it works:
- Schedule status updates in advance and respond to followers.
- You can choose to upgrade for analytics and other features to integrate your marketing strategies.
13. Adobe Photoshop Express
How it works:
- Photoshop does the basic image editing like cropping, rotating, red eye and blemish removal.
- It also makes it easy to correct contrast, white balance, exposure, and also apply filter.
14. Dotloop
This app is another Transaction Management Software that lets you easily create, capture and store all the paperwork required to close even the most complex deals.
Image from: fitsmallbusiness.com
How it works:
- Create custom templates, send documents out for e-signature, and track, collaborate, and store documents for review and compliance.
- Dotloop helps simplify the paperwork, faxing, and in-person signings in your deals.
15. MagicPlan
Take a photo and use MagicPlan to showcase your current properties or wow your potential clients.
How it works:
- Create custom 3D floor plans – this app records room dimensions and produces floor plans in multiple formats.
16. Box
Box is the ideal app for realtors who are looking for more security and control.
How it works:
- View, download, edit and annotate files, and then securely send those files to anyone, anywhere.
- You can also mark a folder for offline viewing.
17. Showing Suite
Showing Suite Software lets you finally toss the pile of notes—showings, email addresses, phone numbers and lockbox codes—in the recycling bin where they belong.
How it works:
- The app integrates and automates showing schedules, buyer agent feedback, and any notes that you want to store along with your listing.
- It also syncs with your Supra EKey or Sentrilock lockbox software.
18. BizKinetic Real Estate
How it works:
- Manage your sales and marketing efforts by coordinating leads, follow-ups, contacts and client requests.
- You can also sync your tasks and calendar, and set up mail templates
19. IFTTT
IFTTT stands for “If This Then That” which aims to automate tasks between Internet-connected services. The app has more than 160 channels for you to create connections between.
How it works:
Set up configurations such as:
- If you want new comments on your blog to send you a text message.
- You want to backup each new contact you add to your phone in a Google spreadsheet.
- Or maybe even log how much time you spend at home or the office.
20. Real Scout
Another Lead Nurturing app is the Real Scout.
How it works:
- This app scours your MLS for new listings that match any of up to 400 criteria your leads select such as the following and automatically sends them the listings in an email:
- waterfront location
- high ceilings
- number of bedrooms etc..
- It will also make the generated emails look like they came directly from you.
21. Todoist
This real estate tool can save you time hunting email through your inbox.
How it works:
- When you are logged in your email account, you can add any email as a follow up task.
- When you select a particular task, the app brings up the email originally referenced in the task.
22. Home Value Leads
Image from: fitsmallbusiness.com
How it works:
- This lead generation system offers agents a customizable home value estimator that you can use on your IDX website or Facebook ads.
- It also provides lead follow up via built in drip campaigns and instant lead notification
23. Deductr 2
When it comes to tax time, Deductr 2 is an app that will aid you in tracking tax deductions.
How it works:
- Use the app to add business income and expenses, log receipts, even track mileage using your phone’s GPS.
- When tax time comes, use the Deductr website to create a profit and loss report, tax summary, mileage summary, etc.
24. Citymaps
This Custom Mapping App answers the never-ending client question “Where are the best ________in this neighborhood?”
How it works:
- With Citymaps, you can send your clients custom maps of a neighborhood tailored to their interests.
- This real estate software also helps plan locations for retail stores and other commercial listings.
25. Videolicious
How it works:
- First record yourself talking into the camera.
- Then, add any photos or videos over the top as b-roll.
- Next, add background music and cinematic filters to your photos and video footage.
The completed videos can be saved, emailed and shared via social media channels like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
26. Matterport
If you have read our previous article Real Estate Marketing Trends, we mentioned Matterport as one of the most trending apps for real estate agents that create 3D Virtual Tours.
Image from: fitsmallbusiness.com
How it works:
- Create 3D tours for high-end properties.
- Ask your photographer about Matterport or look for a 3D tour company in your area.
27. Buffer
The Buffer app provides a great interface for managing multiple social media accounts like Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and LinkedIn.
How it works:
- Schedule what you want to share and when you want the posts to be shared.
- Don’t forget to engage with any replies or comments that come in.
28. Mojo Dialer
This auto dialer app is intended for all For Sale By Owner (FSBO) cold callers to build up momentum and get appointments.
How it works:
- Mojo Dialer integrates with your FSBO lists and dials numbers automatically while pulling up pertinent information on your screen.
29. Lastpass
Secure your different passwords hassle-free. Lastpass is a powerful cross platform password manager that enables you to access and manage passwords wherever you are, and syncs those passwords between your devices.
How it works:
- For iOS 8 users, Lastpass integrates directly into Safari as an extension.
- If you access password-protected sites regularly, you might choose their premium service ($12 annual fee).
30. BombBomb
“Video Email” BombBomb app lets you record and send video for delivering a personal message. It also gives you metrics to track who is viewing your content.
Interested in real estate marketing but not sure where to start? Check out our real estate virtual assistant services and see how our highly qualified and trained VAs can assist in your everyday tasks and objectives. CALL 1-866-596-9041.
We would love to hear if these tips worked for you! If you have questions or any Real Estate related success stories, please leave a comment below.
Reference:
fitsmallbusiness.com
southbayaor.com
blog.narrpr.com
Last Updated: May 15, 2018
10 Benefits of Bookkeeping Services from a Virtual Assistant
- Pay only for the work needed – The virtual bookkeeping assistant can come in handy when you have only a couple of tasks to be done, when you need it done.
- Cost-effective solution – Save money by not having to spend on office space and supplies (computer, furniture, utilities, etc.), employee benefits, and other things that come with full or part-time employees.
- More time for you – Outsourcing accounting services can save you hours crunching numbers on your desk. Think of all the things that you would have time to focus on now! You can have more time with your family, or more time investing in your business.
- Be updated on payments – You can also give your bookkeeper VA access to take care of your invoices on creditors and suppliers. He or she can also check the effective balances of your accounts online to help with the flow of the business.
- Organize income sources – In a growing business, it’s ideal to maintain each of your client’s account as its own profit center so you can measure their individual performance. But organizing each of these accounts can be cumbersome. An efficient VA is well-versed with one or two small business accounting software that can track all transactions.
- Fully managed and monitored – When you hire a virtual bookkeeping assistant from a virtual assistant outsourcing company you are also assigned a project manager to ensure that everything runs smoothly.
- Monitor Your KPI’s – Know your company’s financial standing. There are three key reports that must be submitted to the business owner: cash flow statement, income statement, and cash disbursement schedule
- Certified and trained – Virtual Assistant Talent (VAT) will give you VAs with a strong education (VAT assistants have college degrees) and a competitive work experience and skill set.
- Keep track of the flow of money – One of the top benefits of outsourcing bookkeeping is that you get to keep a clean and orderly record book. Tracking receipts, noting accounts payable and receivables, taking care of quarterly tax returns are just a few of the things a bookkeeper is responsible for.
- Focus on your core function – Bookkeeping is a vital back office task that becomes a casualty if your have more core functions to attend to. At first you will assume this responsibility but as you gain traction, it’s better to go for outsourced bookkeeping services for small business.
If your business does not observe efficient bookkeeping processes, you will be at risk of compromising all the efforts you have done to grow your company.
Managing a business alone is a difficult and understandably time-consuming task. Hiring a virtual bookkeeper can help you make sure your books are being done accurately and timely. CALL US at 1-866-596-9041 to learn more.
We would love to hear if these tips worked for you! If you have questions or any business outsourcing related success stories, please leave a comment below.
References:
