How to Easily Improve Search Engine Rankings With Hubspot

Search. This is something that has not only seemed like a vague, mysterious world for anyone outside of marketing but also to many marketers for many years. I know many who have, dare I say, pretty much abandoned search engine optimization (SEO) strategies because they don't really trust what anyone is saying out there about what really works. They believe they're just going to end up going into a rabbit hole and never getting that time back in their life.

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SEO, Strategy, inbound marketing

What is Smarketing and Why Should I Care?

In the previous blog, Are You Planning for Failure, I discussed some conversion rates to consider when determining whether your business is doing enough marketing to generate enough leads—to generate enough sales—and to hit its profit and revenue goals for the year.

This week, I want to introduce the concept of Smarketing, which is a fairly new concept just like inbound marketing, that can help guarantee you're getting the best quality leads and that those leads are turning into sales.

Smarketing stands for sales and marketing. The key shift here by smashing the two words together is *alignment.* Traditionally, sales and marketing teams have mostly been at odds. Sales thinks marketing is out of touch and marketing thinks sales doesn't follow up enough on leads.

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Strategy, smarketing

Are You Planning for Failure?

Well the first quarter of 2015 is over. Tax liabilities are rolling in and Q1 reports are being analyzed. Are you on track to meet your 2015 goals? Revenue and profit aren't the only factors to consider here. So are leads and conversion rates.

stats

Look at Conversion Rates

The average Hubspot conversion rate from visit to lead is 5% and from lead to customer is 2%. So if your goal is to get one customer per month, your website would typically need 1,000 visits in order to reach that goal.

Other numbers to consider are average revenue per client, in relation to your company's revenue goals. If one of your goals is to get $500,000 more in revenue this year and your average monthly revenue per customer is $10,000, then you would need about five to ten new clients, assuming they don't all sign up January 1.

How many leads would it take to get there? About 500 with a conversion rate for lead to customer of 2%. Obviously referrals have a higher close rate, which is why they're so sought-after, but if you're just counting on referrals alone are you really going to grow as fast as you'd like? 

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Analytics, Strategy

How Inbound Marketing Can Automate Your Sales Force

In the first two posts in this three-part series about inbound marketing, we explained how buyer personas and campaigns work. Once you've conquered those methodologies and practices, it's time to take your inbound marketing to the next level with automated workflows.

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Strategy, Inbound, Workflows

The Two Main Differences Between Marketing and PR

By @JackieClews

The world of digital marketing is often a vague, mysterious world.

That's why at DMD we are very dedicated to blogging about digital marketing to increase your knowledge of what it is we do, and what we don't do, such as public relations (PR).

This week I was at a networking event, where I was excited to meet a local PR professional. While I was discussing this person with another marketer, he asked me to articulate what the difference is between the two.

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Strategy, Agencies, PR

Why A Blog Is So Important For Your Bottom Line

 

Are you wondering why someone might take the time to write a blog or pay to have one professionally written and managed by someone else for their business's website?

Because it works.

Blogs have evolved a lot in the past 10 or so years when they were first people rambling their thoughts in their basement for the world to read. Now, they're a serious source of business.

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Social Media, SEO, Strategy, Content, Inbound, Email, Blogging, Advertising

Six Ways to Make Your Business More Profitable With Consumer Data


A few months ago, I was having lunch at my favorite local sports bar in my old neighborhood during a visit to Milwaukee, Wis. I started talking to the owner of the restaurant, whose business had just undergone major renovations and was near a bridge that had just reopened after major construction so that traffic could again begin flowing. From the outside, with the new paint, LED signs, newly paved parking lot, and landscaping and busy traffic, the business looked stellar.

But from the inside and from the mouth of the restaurant owner, sales and traffic weren’t so great.

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Strategy, Data, Consumer Data, Retail

Five Things You Need to Know Before Your Business Buys Data

 

When it comes to direct marketing, the data or lists your business uses is one of the most important part of the equation for marketing success. Other important factors for marketing success are the timing and the offer used in your promotions. So before you send out that email blast, direct mailer or throw $500 into that Google Adwords campaign, there are a few important things you should consider before you make the investment in the marketing campaign and especially before you buy the data that is driving the effort.

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Strategy, Data, Email

How to Add Display Ads to Your Site in Six Easy Steps

There are many options for integrating ads into Wordpress, the solutions for which will vary depending upon your particular needs, but for most scenarios there are a few key points you will want to hit:

  1. Dynamic ads that will change between each page load so you don't see the same ad in the same place all the time.
  2. Easily editable ads. You want to be able to swap ads in and out at a moment's notice.
  3. Support for plain images and links, as well as code snippets like the kind generated by Google AdSense.
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How to, Strategy, Agencies, Display Ads, Advertising

How to Use Social Media Confidently and Effectively

Have you tweeted today?

As few as eight years ago, that question would have been as puzzling to teenagers as to their parents. But that was then, and this is now. The fact is, social media is one of the most powerful, effective—and cost-effective—tools available today for promoting your business, reaching out to new clients and keeping current clients interested, engaged and informed.

In short, social media does everything traditional advertising used to do, only better. It has the potential for precision-tailored marketing that's both personable and brand-specific, coupled with an immediacy and relevancy that appeals to today's tech-savvy clientele.

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Social Media, Strategy, Content, Inbound, Advertising, Healthcare

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