You know, first of all how your target market functions, so you know, do they work a nine-to-five or they entrepreneurs or they stay-at-home moms? That kind of stuff is really important and then it’s also kind of their hobbies or things that they would be looking for on Instagram. So you have to kind of put yourself in their shoes and figure out. You know what do they do on a day to day basis and what might they be looking at when they’re on Instagram? So, yes, that’s kind of you know where I start for that, once you’re familiar with who that is, then you can kind of you know either start looking for that person on Instagram, so based on maybe accounts that they follow or hashtags.
Do you think they might be using and you can look into their accounts, see what hashtags they are using and kind of go from there. So if my stay-at-home mom is using hashtag stay-at-home mom, then you know you might want to consider using that on your posts. As well in order to kind of attract them to your feeds, all right, so it’s identifying knowing who your target audience like your your best customers right, like who’s spending, the most amount of money into your business, finding them on Instagram and just seeing how they’re they’re, Using hashtags on their own posts is that right right, that’s right! Yeah, because you know it’s, you need to kind of understand how that they, how they kind of categorize their photos and what they’re doing on Instagram.
So once you know that it’s you all! You really have to do is kind of steal, a couple of their tags, put it on your post and now, when they’re looking into those, because those are the times that they like to frequent, often they’re, going to find your post right. And if your content appeals to your target market, because you know you’ve already gone through those steps and you’re creating content specifically for them, then they’re going to follow you or they’re going to engage with you or they’re going to click on the link in your file.
I think this is a. I think this is a step that a lot of people skip, because they think. Okay, I know the the hashtags that people use are. These are the popular ones. These are what other accounts are using, but they’re not looking at their specific target customer and their audience and doing the spending the time to do the research to see and engage deeper with their audience in the hash tags in those communities where they’re hanging out.
So do you see a lot of people missing this step on how crucial is it yeah, absolutely yeah? It’S important that you mentioned popular tags like most people. Think, oh! Well, you know. If I tag happy, it’s got: 40 million fall or 40 million posts associated with it like that, should bring me some traffic, and while there is a very small chance that it may bring you traffic, the people hashtagging happy are so obscure that it really has nothing To do with you know your business of selling graphic design services, for example, right so yeah.
So by using popular tags you may gain exposure, but it’s not from the right people. So, yes, it’s extremely popular that you are extremely important, that you choose the right tags with the right post counts associated with them all right. So, if we’re looking at that example, that of the graphic designer looking to promote and sell their services through Instagram, can you maybe walk us through how that person would be able to use and identify the right, Reese tags, hash tags and how they then implement it? In the business ultimately get a sale and get that end result from from a follower and a customer right.
Okay, so I for me it’s a it’s a combination of tags that you use so the first couple of tags, you should add – are tags that describe your business. Okay, so that’s going to be graphic design! That’S going to be web designer! Any tags like that. That actually describe what you do. The next thing you want to do is kind of describe your audience and hash tags so who’s. Looking for your graphic design service, is it somebody who you know needs of rebranding, so they might hashtag rebrand or hashtag? I need you know.
I need design help or something like that like it’s, it takes a little bit of time, so it’s hard for me to come up with a hashtag right off the bat. But if you get into the app you know you go to the search of the magnifying glass icon and start typing in you know, graphic design and then you’ll see a bunch of related tags that Instagram brings up. Then, when you click on one of those you’ll. Also see related tags across the top of your screen, so it’s kind of oh yeah, you kind of have to click here.
Click there keep clicking until you get deeper and deeper and you’ll be exposed to all of these tags that are kind of around your industry. So it does take a little bit of work, but they all they are all there. You just kind of have to start with one keyword and kind of work, your way into the depths of Instagram hashtags. You
In the last episode of marketing tuna, we talked about the home base and the outposts the home base. Your website is at the center of everything you do, but how do you make that home base convert people from just looking to actually becoming a lead and ultimately becoming a sail? That’S what we want to talk about today.
So when we look at our home base, we think about it as a traditional sales. Funnel we have prospects, people who know you exist, they might hear your radio ad, they might come to your website. They might see your car at a sporting event. We have leads people who have filled out some kind of information, giving you a name or told you what car they’re interested in and ultimately, sales people who have either serviced their vehicle or bought a vehicle from you.
Now the only goal of our website should be moving people down the sales funnel. We have all these people coming in the top these prospects. They might come from ads social media. You know email all of our outposts, but then what we want to measure is how many of those prospects are turning into leads. In other words, what’s our conversion rate, so, let’s just take a little example. Let’S say that we have thousand people coming to our website.
If a hundred of them fill out a form, you can do the math in your head. What’S our conversion rate, kids, that’s right, ten percent! So how about? If one of those people end up buying a car, you can see that we have a 10 % conversion from some weed to sale and we have a 10 % conversion from prospect to lead now. There’S two ways that we can increase sales on this website. We can either throw more people in the top or we can increase the conversion between each step.
So, if we’re not doing much on social media or email or ads, the easiest step might be to increase that number on top, maybe instead of a thousand it becomes ten thousand, then you can see that we now have a thousand leads and ten sales. That’S not bad, we increase 10x number of sales, but if we can’t drive more people to the site, if we’re already getting lots of traffic, we can just increase the conversion rate.
So what might we do? We might create a button, for example, when people are searching for a vehicle that they can tell us what they’re looking for now we have that name in our system and we can start talking to them. Maybe when people service their vehicle, we take their phone number and we send them text messages. So we have more people into our lead system or we might make the buttons fewer on the home page.
So there’s a clear call-to-action one way for them to give us their information if we can increase it. This conversion rate, even a couple percentage points, you’re going to see big conversions on the bottom of the sales funnel. So when you’re, looking at your website, two things you want to think about: how can we throw more people in the top through our outposts and how can we make that website? Do one simple thing get people to give us their contact information.
Very rarely. Are people going to make a sale on Facebook or email or social media? We need to get them to our website where they learn about us, where they fill out information, and we can know who they are once we know who that person is, you can do what you do best, which is sell cars in just two minutes a week. You can save time, save money and sell more cars with the marketing tune-up subscribe on our website to get started today.
So we’re going to go to my profile here and I’m going to show you a couple things that you want to pay attention to, and the first thing that I want you to think about is your headline: okay, a lot of people. I see their headline a lot of people, some headlines say I’m CEO or I’m an accountant or an attorney people. What I want you to do when your regular LinkedIn profile.
I want you to speak to the people that are reading it. I want it to be client-facing, I don’t people, don’t care that you’re CEO right, they care what you can do to help them. So in this headline which, by the way, is searchable by Google and which, by the way, comes up and I’ll, show you exactly. We were talking about before I’ll put my name in a Google search and I’ll show you how it comes up and you’ll see in this Google search and right here.
Like I said, the second thing that comes up is LinkedIn, but you can see my headline right. So you can read that headline right into the Google search before you even get into LinkedIn, so you definitely want to start off with a strong headline and – and you want to have a headline – that’s constantly telling people what you do just really saying when you are Searching for your profile, so your name on Google.
I noticed that you know you mentioned before that you have over. You know 60,000 followers on Twitter, yet the LinkedIn result came above. It did yeah yeah, yep, 65,000 followers. It says here and Leasing came out. I do not have 65,000 LinkedIn connections, so LinkedIn came up higher now if LinkedIn doesn’t come up as hired for you. I do think that if you, if you’re active on Linkedin, it’s going to come up higher if you’re, regularly posting and you’re giving new content on LinkedIn, it’s going to give Google more reasons to bring it up even higher.
And you want that right, especially if you’re taking the time to have a great profile. You want it to come up high, because that’s what people are going to check out right. You want people to be confident. You want to be confident when people are checking you out, okay, so so again in your headline, you know I often tell people when you’re writing your headline. If you don’t feel a little queasy when you hit Send, then you haven’t been confident enough in portraying yourself right.
So you don’t you know you don’t say I’m pretty good at this. You need to say I’m an expert or, like I say, I’m a successful social media strategist. You want to remember you’re more expert than the people that you’re helping, so you nobody’s going to hire me if I say I’m pretty good at LinkedIn right. So I say I own in the fact that I’m a LinkedIn expert and I and I you know people that makes people want to hire me if they’re looking at two profiles and one is constantly saying, they’re an expert and the other ones saying I do this Stuff, you know which one are you going to hire right, so you need to be confident and and really really go out on a limb and telling people how great you are in this red line.
I mean, I think you know. That’S that’s part of your personal brand right. You really want to make sure that you’re positioning yourself as an expert in the eyes of your target customer. So I think this needs to be really okay. What would my ideal customer want to see when they, they read a profile or they’re looking to purchase from someone like me right right? So that’s you use like I like to use like a financial planner as an example.
If you’re, a financial planner you and four thousand forty thousand four hundred thousand other people have that in their headline on LinkedIn. But if your headline says I’m a financial planner that helps women over 50 or over 60 transition from a salary to retirement. Now you’ve got people listening right now, you’re telling them what you’re doing like, who you help and how you help them, and that’s and now you’re going to have people click on that.
So think about what you do and what your special sauce is, that you can put in this headline to attract people to want to click on it. I’M just looking at this headline now as well, and I just normally a lot of people use it for their title, maybe they’re their founder or you know, marketing associate or whatever that might be in that area. So they used to maybe putting one two. Maybe three words in that area I mean I can see there.
You’Ve got three lines, multiple word, what’s the recommendation, so here’s the thing, Google reads this section and I want Google to bring people to my profile. So I’m going to feed Google as much as I can I’m going to think about what are people searching for that I wan na come up as the search result and I’m going to use those words in my headline and I’m going to give Google as much As I can to work with right, so if somebody is searching for a LinkedIn speaker on Google, I want them to bring up my LinkedIn profile right or a social media speaker or social media strategist.
So what you know you don’t want to waste any opportunity to give more, to give Google more reasons. Different people to your profile and LinkedIn LinkedIn is also a powerful search engine in and of itself. So, even if they’re just searching within LinkedIn for LinkedIn expert or LinkedIn speaker, I want my profile to come up. So so you want to use those as many of those words as you can in the in the areas that are searchable so adjusting that in that area, is there a minimum maximum amount of there is? I don’t know I don’t actually know the number.
This is about the maximum. I would be surprised if there’s more than three or four characters more than this um and you’ll notice, I put the little stars in to kind of make it pop a little. I just did that because I you know, I teach this stuff, so I I show people, you know how to do this, as you can see in my headline, so I teach people how to do this, and sometimes you know you want to just stand out from The crowd a little bit, so it’s okay to use these little extra characters.
You don’t know the exact number, but you want to keep going until they totally knock you out, and then you want to keep tweaking it, and so you can use as many characters as you can. Okay, and I think it’s important not to just think about it. For search engine, I mean it’s great to be found, but then it’s also super important to you know the the Rideau or that target customer to make sure that you’re positioned in their eyes as an expert and doesn’t look too.
It needs to look natural and that’s probably more important than this keywords. I agree if you can use the keywords, use them, but more importantly, and more people are going to find it is because they searched for you or they knew you were. They got your business card or you connected with them, because you’re in the same business group right more people are going to see your profile. That way, then, are going to find you from a Google search or a LinkedIn search, so make sure that you’re exactly right.
Li and make sure that you’re telling people how you can help them. Most importantly, you
Social signals are very real and help your search rankings. Learn more in the video below.
Let’S say you want to start an online business or maybe have an existing business and you think it’s time to start Instagram marketing, but you’ve never had an Instagram profile. You don’t know how it works and you don’t know where to start. So today, I’m going to give you five steps you need to follow at the beginning.
First of all, you need to know what you’re going to sell. You need to know your product or service, because if you decide to change your product later on, if you have to change the whole thing again like you need to change your profile, you need to change your marketing campaigns and you need to change the whole approach. As well, then, you need to define your target audience. Many people think that their target audience is everyone who is interested in their product, but in stock.
It’S too general your target audience and the group of people who will buy your product. So you need to do some research try to find out where your target audience spends time online, what information they are looking for, it’s not allowed just to post marketing messages on the social media. You need to find out what your audience wants and needs and adjust. Your content and create content for them, the content that will give them value – and they will be interested in then define your positioning, which means what market problem your product or service can solve, and what makes your product or service stand out from the competitors once you Have all this information registered Instagram switch your personal account into a business account you can do easily in the settings of your account, start preparing valuable content and put the right information in your bio.
Your bio should attract your target audience so explain in what two sentences? What you do and what, whether you can bring to that and that’s it guys, start posting your content on a regular basis, build relationship with your audience and use different marketing campaigns to grow your business, guys I’ll try to go through all these steps in more detail. In my upcoming articles, don’t forget to hit subscribe button if you want to get a notification about my new content.
Thank you for reading and I will see you very soon. Bye, bye, you
Other then Social
How's your website? Need a new one? Are you looking for a PRO? Check out the video below:
Everything that’s really going on and I was like you know what this same exact share. That’S going to work for my business really works for any type of business right, especially real estate agents and Especially agents who don’t have a big marketing budget that you can go through and implement some of these different strategies To take things to the next level. Right now, One thing that I feel like I always focus on and almost every business owner Always focuses on, is getting new leads right.
Getting new customers in like that next person, right you’re, like you, you’re, always looking for that Next new thing, because it’s kind of like that shiny object of like Oh new, leads more people like all that stuff building that audience with the most valuable leads, the most Valuable audience network is already in your existing database. The reason why is because, More than likely, they already know who you are: okay, They’re, a warm audience or hot market, and they know like they kind of they have a little bit more trust And you have a little more credibility with them as opposed to a Brand new Lea who has no idea who you are You got to go through and build that trust.
You got to build that rapport, that Credibility, that authority and all that something it could be very expensive, very difficult and time-consuming right. So the number one way to go through as a real estate agent or any business owner out there and Take things to the next level is by using your low-hanging fruit, your existing database right and that’s one thing I’m looking to go through and do because I’ve Been going through and marketing a cold audience for last year and a half plus and It’s been very expensive and very like you know, I put a lot of invest a lot of money into advertising And it’s been good.
It’S been rewarding, obviously, but now I’ve got this pretty big audience. I can go through and I can market to, and they already know who I am okay, There’s like like they have a good idea of like okay. This is what value he brings and how he can help me, and now I can just go through and Add a more value to that existing audience and the same thing goes for you If you’re in real estate, no matter how long you’ve been real estate You’re.
Just barely getting in, you probably have an existing contact database, whether it’s on LinkedIn in your phonebook Or you know just some other network that you’ve got like Gmail or Outlook or any of these other contacts. And There are several ways through digital marketing that you can go through and utilize all this information right. So the first one is, if you have someone’s name their phone number, an email address.
You can take that data And you can import that into Facebook right and you can create a custom audience. Oh we’ve talked about that on previous articles. You can take that save data And you can upload that into Google. Ok and you’ve got that custom. Audience is saying: hey, Google! These are all like my people like their either past clients or their leads all that stuff. Take that same data. You upload it into your CRM Right.
So now, if you guys look at this, take a look at this for a second. If somebody’s going through, let’s say you have a competitive or a Competing agent in your market right and they’re, going to go through and they’re going to send out, maybe a new email To their list, or maybe, let’s, like let’s say It’s your same exact contact database Right, your same exact people, they’re looking to buy or sell their home, But they’re only going to send out an email, maybe once a week a little acute newsletter from one of the little you know: email, marketing, software’s, they’ve got and They’re going to do that.
Maybe once every week or once every two weeks, But then you you, wouldn’t uploaded your your database into Facebook, alright. So now you can go through and market to them, not only on Facebook, But also on Instagram. You upload it into Google. Now You can market to them in the search and Google search on YouTube on these different platforms on blogs right, then you also upload them to your CRM and you’re you’re, not your emailing them as well as send them attacks as well as maybe send them a Facebook, Messenger, and So for every one email that competing agent sends Someone is seeing you that same audience is seeing you on Instagram They’re, seeing you on Facebook They’re, seeing you on Google and YouTube in their email inbox in their on their phone.
They’Re. See you all these places now, if you think about that, if you got one person sending out just one email Casually every once in a while versus somebody who they’re seeing literally on all these different platforms, Who do you think is going to Win? Who do you think is going to actually get that this right? Is the person that’s going to be more present and honestly, a lot of you probably reading this article You’re not even sending Just that one casual email once a month or once every couple of weeks? You’Re? Probably just you have this goldmine, this database and you’re just letting it sit there now.
Obviously, I’m not trying to go through and harp on you because I do it. I fall prey to the same exact thing, But I’m trying to go through and and take things to the next level and the cool thing is is With Facebook. When you go through an upload, this custom audience of data, You literally, can go and spend 50 cents or $ 1 per day remarketing to this exact audience, and the cool thing is When I was on the phone with one of my facebook ads reps a couple Weeks ago, He Said that if you have a custom audience that your ads are actually going to show Before any other ads out there right so like if you basically have told Facebook Hey.
This is already one of my customers. It’S going to show before some other person, That’s just marketing to their cold audience because they Facebook’s like okay. They already know like and trust this person They’re already like an authority somewhat and so Facebook wants to show ads and content and posts all that stuff. There’S going to be more relevant to that audience right so Really, quick guys! The takeaways from this article is one make sure you’re leveraging and utilizing your warm market.
Okay, don’t just let that sit there. You know picking up dust and all that stuff make sure going after that warm market, Because that is where you’re going to see a lot quicker results then going through and running a cold ad to anyone on Facebook, on Instagram, on YouTube or even Going and buying Leads on Zillow Trulia realtor.Com any of those other marketplaces, alright. So, But we also at the same time, we always want to be growing that database, So we want to have some cold lead generation going, so we’re always bringing more people in.
So when is there time to go through, buy or sell a home that our Authority is built out and they can be know like and trust us right? The second thing is, is taking that data and Upload into Facebook is a custom audience. Okay and being present on Facebook, on Instagram Upload into Google and being present on Google search on on YouTube right and then also uploaded to your CR and being present in IVA and their email INBOX K on text messages in their messenger inbox K on all these Different platforms, So we can go through and market to them.
Okay and another key thing. The third key takeaway, I would say, is don’t just always go through and spam different properties or open house or anything like that, Make sure you’re having a little bit of a personal touch and a personal flair to it. That’S showing you, maybe, with your spouse, you with your kids, you with you know at the park, Maybe with your dog or whatever it is so then people can see like oh they’re there, like a normal human being like me Right, so they can go through and That have that connection.
If you go through and you’re like a basketball fan or a football fan, or whatever Show a picture of you at a game or supporting your favorite team or whatever, It is really like. People want to see that you’re, a real person And you’re not just always just spamming out stuff about your business kay so Anyway, guys keep those three things in mind: your warm market, That’s where tons and tons of gold is found number two make sure you’re utilizing That warm market – Just don’t let it sit there on the Shelf.
Gathering dust, okay And the number three make sure you’re showing to your audience to your customer database That your real person right, like you’re, not always pushing stuff about your business but make sure you’re going through and branding yourself. Okay, and so people want to go through. They can connect with you on a deeper level like if you’re, a huge like. Let’S say You live in Dallas in your huge Mavericks fan or a Cowboys fan okay When they go through and they talk to you you’re your customer, your potential client.
They have something to connect with you deeper beyond, just like oh you’re, going to go, sell my home or you’re going to Help me buy a home or whatever you could talk about the Cowboys last game or the the Mavericks last game, Or you know whatever the Topic might be, and you guys can connect at a deeper level there for deepening the relationship, The trust, the credibility authority, all that good stuff to help you go through and grow your business right so anyway, guys.
Hopefully, today’s a little thought it helped you guys in some way make sure you take that data Upload it if you guys need help as far as like knowing how to go through and do that Guys. I’Ve got tons of article on my blog, I’m showing you how to upload that info into the Facebook audience manager. Show you how to upload into Google showing how to upload into your CRM and Taking advantage of all these resources that you have at your fingertips.
In 2018, guys Technology is at its best right now. You have so many ways: they’re, cheap, easy and for just a dollar a day you can be going through and reaching this whole entire Audience right. So anyway, with that said, if you has a brand new here, my name is Jason Wardrop, I’m trying to launch a new article every single day on how to generate more leads, Make more money and crow. Your business so make sure you guys subscribe because you’re not subscribed yet Also, if you guys, like today’s content, go ahead, give it a thumbs up comment down below.
Let me know what you guys are doing to go through a differentiate yourself from the competition in your Marketplace and also, let me know how I can be helpful. I’Ll try to drop some links down below in the description in the comments section articles of how to upload those contact database to your Facebook, Ads manager To Google to your CRM all that to help you guys go through progress and with that said guys.
I hope you all have an amazing week and I hope you guys are killing it in 2018 and with that said guys, I will see you all tomorrow.
Maybe I have a coffee Shop that has a skate park in the back, who knows, What’s kind of the first step. What should I be looking at So think about your audience? I know Instagram is Definitely preferred by teens and Millennials, so that’ll be Great for your business idea, which you stole from me, ( laughing ), But also some cons like a lot Of the platforms out there there’s a pay to play component Right.
It’S important to Think about who are you trying to target before You even get on there Also identify your voice. Because you wan na be on there and be consistent because After all, it’s your brand, So you don’t wan na Be one way on one post then 360 on another post, And it’s hard to follow, Yeah, which I know for small businesses, because they’re doing and juggling a million different things. Sometimes they’ll have Four different people at the business doing the Instagram, And while I see why they’re doing that, it comes off that way.
And it’s too inconsistent from the way the photos Look to the coloring to the captions. It’S just there’s, no consistency there! Absolutely! So what about my profile? I’Ve seen some pretty great profiles. I’M just looking around I’ve seen some bad ones. What are some best practices? And things to avoid So best practices, definitely Starting with the name, you want your name to Be consistent across –, So Coffee and Kickflips Yeah exactly Again stealing my business ( laughing ), So you wan na be consistent.
Across Instagram, Twitter and Facebook, with That name that handle Also when it comes to Your photo, I’m sure, because it’s a visual platform there’s so many ideas. You wan na put up there Also stay consistent across the platforms and don’t forget your description. What should I really Put in my description Should, I just say: cool Come buy coffee in my shop or what should I do Just give me essentially Your elevator pitch, What makes you unique, Also feel free to just In a way kind of brag, What makes you cool All right, so Instagram Has posts and it has stories, Can you talk to us About some of the things we should look out for When we’re doing a post versus a story Yeah, so there’s a lot to Say about posting on Instagram One thing that I like to Remind small business owners is that it’s important To come off, authentic, consistent, but also professional, So it’s like a balance.
Those are the ingredients. The one good thing with Instagram is that, although it’s a highly visual platform, you don’t have to hire a photographer And give us a sense of That behind the scenes Who works there, The outside the inside of your business. I love that because you Can really get a sense of I’m already there, But you’re not you’re, maybe On the go or chilling at home on your couch, but you Could feel like you’re already at that business? I’Ve got a great idea.
Should we do behind the scenes? Let’S do a behind the scenes Right now Right now Absolutely So. This is really going to bring to life what we’re doing for All of y’all out there We’ll see if this makes the cut Okay cool, So we got behind the Scenes here of the crew Say: hi, Please, document this Perfect height, Oh, come on man, ( laughing ), All right, diving back in So line ( laughing ) Back to what we’re actually talking about You’re on Instagram, Great Literally all day.
Now what You wan na be active, proactive, So as a business, it’s really important that you’re paying Attention to when a customer or potential customer Comments on your post Let’em know. You heard Like their comment, respond back Also, if they’re tagging your business or mentioning acknowledge that as well And that can help with customer retention. I mentioned a business that I was at and I was traveling and doing My own thing on the road – and I just mentioned them – Because they had amazing soy latte and I was stoked on it Sure enough.
They respond Back with this genuine message of thanks for business, And even though I preach About this all the time and educate business owners on doing this, and it happened to me – I felt truly valuable and it like made my day So I’m more likely to go back. And do business with them Yeah I love it. We have an easy way. Just To actually talk to people, If you go up to a random Stranger and say hi they’re like wait.
What are you doing On Instagram, it’s just the norm Or if you call me don’t call me Who calls It’s 2019, So cool so give us a lowdown On just Instagram search Yeah, so Instagram Search is really helpful if you’re looking to for Example, grow your following: You wan na look for a target. Audience of your own look for people talking About things that pertain to your business Search those hashtags, Yes, search, hashtags So you can find people that are relevant and follow them, so you’re growing, an Organic following right Right, But also you can chime in On conversations with people, So maybe you area vegan restaurant.
Let me know I’ll be there. So if you’re, a vegan restaurant, maybe search for other people, Talking about vegan cooking vegan recipes, maybe you Then follow a vegan, blog or a chef and that way You’Re really cultivating this niche bubble, which Will ultimately help your engagement, which we’ll Talk about engagement right, I mean you brought it up, please Without further ado, So engagement right is really important because you wan na make sure You’Re measuring your success on there.
So engagement rate is your ROI, So you hear me say the word a lot, but what it actually is it’s some math. Are you ready? No, What was your best subject in school? Not math, Not math? Okay. So it’s really simple. Engagement rate is the number of likes divided by your followers times. 100 Carry the three divided by… ( laughing ), All right cool I’ll write it down for you later. Thank you, But that’s going to give you some insight as to hey this post.
It performed well, or it was a flop and Then from there you can even go further because If you’re on Instagram as a business, which you should be as a business page, Then you have insights, You can see what time of Day worked best to post with your audience what Day of the week worked best, and then you look at the engagement rate as well, and it’s just Going to help you to have this approach to posting That’S not so blind Right, it’s not a shot in the dark, It’s more of an educated guess, because it’s not always perfect, but it gets you in the right direction.
Yeah, But again you want to be there and active. So I really can’t stress: The importance of commenting and replying to your Customers as they’re engaging taking the time to engage With your business Literally comment back On every single person, Because they took the time to say something Replay back, Give them that time of day And have fun with the Stories just like we did because that’s truly a live element.
It’S a very organic, authentic element to your personality and your brand, And if you feel like, I don’t have time to do all this, then I Encourage brand ambassadors Get your staff involved in this Also come up with a hashtag. So that way, when your customers Come in they can start getting the content for you. And you can just sit back, use it repurpose it I’m all about efficiency Right. Well, thank you! So much for hashing it out on the Gram.
You’Ve been awesome. Emma Thanks for having me Do it for the Gram. Do it for the Gram Well, this has been The Journey, Make sure you comment and subscribe. So you know when the Articles are coming out next. Thank you again, signing off
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Thank you. You are the bag, lady. Yes, what is the bag? Lady? The bag? Lady? Is a family owned and run curated kind of art collection that people can actually wear and it’s all new products and it ranges from bags to accessories and then all the way now we started with clothing and leggings and blankets and home goods. What is the most expensive bag you’ve ever sold? Oh, I think it was a $ 5,000 bag and one went to Peru, we’re so lucky.
We have a lot of international customers that seek us out and find us from the power of the Internet, and so that’s been one of our top-selling bags and you brought a couple bags with us to show us what you have sure Mary Francis is a line That we’ve been working with for 20-plus years, hand beaded made in the Philippines and every season and collection, it’s a new collection and it’s limited so she’s, wonderful, she’s based in California – and this is, we learned both of our sign.
Yes, it’s the horoscope collection and we did very well with us actually and that’s a new body shape and style, and people love the horoscope stuff, great yeah. That’S also a Mary Francis and it’s all hand beaded in the work is fantastic, she’s, very artsy she’s. Very, the names of the items are super cool and we love working with them have limited pieces of Gucci and we love the Gucci stuff, especially the florals.
We love what’s happening with the brand now that it’s just doing so well and he’s taking it to this eco. He took far out of the line. Alessandra Michel he’s the new director and he’s just with the rockstars and he’s doing great and transforming the company, and I really honor that there’s a lot of beautiful stuff here, coach and michael kors, our you know our everyday line and we do excellent with coach and Michael kors, those are our mainstay plain leather goods and beautiful stuff, and then johnny was they just came out with this new perfume and this oil, and we are doing well with that whole line great, I feel like we’re on the Home Shopping Network.
This is awesome. You know this is definitely not my world. This is your world. In fact, I learned that since 1976, your parents started a business with high-end shoes. Tell us a little bit about how about your parents business and how you kind of inherited the kind of luxury woman’s market. Well, they came to the states and they from Russia, and then they met in Israel. They both did the army and then they were in Israel and married and then they moved to the States.
My parents wanted the American Dream and they took over this man’s shop and started with shoes and all sorts of designer women’s comfort shoes from Italy from the United States, and then I was born a year or so later, and you know it’s just it’s interesting. My my parents, Mike on my mother’s side, are immigrants from Europe as well and to Philadelphia, and they actually ran a shoe store as well, but it was a low hand, okay store in kind of a rough neighborhood in Philadelphia, so kind of same business.
Other end of the spectrum, amazing: what was the name of the store when it started in 76? It started with shoe club and it was in Aventura Florida, yes, which is kind of just outside of Miami, and then it moved on and they named it Michels. After me yeah, so they called my dad Michele for a while, and so he would respond to it because he was the face of the business and everything and he’s so helpful and love talking to people and the stories.
We’D have like multi-generations come in to chop and it was fantastic, so many years and we’ve developed several stores and relationships with the local community and everyone knew if they needed something special for an event or for every day where to come to the store. And you worked at the stores. Yes talk a little bit about some of the things you did around the store. I did everything from merchandising to purchasing doing the buying behind the counter.
We did it old-school, so we were right down on the invoice from closing the shop and to opening it so the whole all of the logistics and then in the mid nineties. You left you have to South Florida. You left the shop, yes and, and you probably thought for good – you left the business I thought so I thought I was going to move on to something else and bigger and different, and and where do you go and how did you find your way back? Well, I went to school in University of Virginia and I love Charlotte’s though I love the mountains and the whole culture was a completely different one that I really ingratiate it into, and then I decided to come back after doing a little bit of time in Florence.
So I was in the mecca of art and fashion for a bit as well: we’ve always had Paris and Israel and Italy in our blood and this European boutique II feel so I bring it back to Florida. I went and moved to the Grove and started working on odd jobs here – Art Director, Marketing Manager and those sort of things, and then I kept the thread of the store. I will always woodwork like one or two days a week, and I saw this opportunity online.
That was a new versioning place for online goods and I started on eBay where I started telling $ 650 item products. At the time when people were selling vintage flea market finds so I started this whole new new items being sold online and I would go to the store to work and then I just ship out what I sold and things were moving online, that wouldn’t move in The store that people would just look at so it was a really different dynamic and I saw this opportunity so you specifically were selling handbags online on eBay.
Yes in the early 2000. Yes can you can you go back to like? How did you learn about eBay and how did you have the the insight / inspiration to sell? You know: multi-hundred dollar thousand dollar, handbags that were new yeah and what was essentially an auction site for flea market and used goods. I just start tried it out, and I do you remember that moment when you’re like okay, tell me about that, is the brand called Isabella Fiore and they did like really beautiful, hand-painted stuff somewhere from Italy somewhere from elsewhere, and they were just sitting and nothing was Moving in the store – and I thought let me check online – see see if so, anyone else in the world has been s or selling it, and I would seize things on eBay and at that time eBay was pretty big for the flea market world and I thought Why not? There is a new with tag option.
Why not try it so I put put a few on and I take like homemade pictures and they started to sell and just like that. It just was a quick happening and did you with eBay, were they auctioned or with a minimum bid yeah we did that and did you were you able to sell them at a higher price than the retail price in your store? No, to be honest, no nowadays I can do that, but those days now I would get MSRP, though, which was great, so it was a way to kind of move merchandise that you just can’t move any other.
Yes, how did it evolve from there from there? I wanted out of the shoes I wanted nothing to do with shoes, because she’s are very difficult. Shoes are tough. How did mom and dad feel about you getting out of their business? Oh, they liked the fact that and they liked it, because my mom wasn’t loving the going to the store every day and dealing with the public, so we iced all bags as an easy thing to ship.
There’S no real size to it. You can gift it easily. So I like the idea of it that it was simple yeah there’s, also not the challenge of whether they fit correct the fit is off and Zappos kind of took over at that time, and I couldn’t compete with as oppas scenario did okay. So then what happened at some point? The retail store, your parents closed the store. We closed the store, yes, the store closed because the rent went up triple yeah and they retired no they’re, still they’re still working a little bit with ya lady, the things flipped yeah.
Now, they’re working for you and well with with me, writing receipts and collecting. You know something like that and soon talk about what happened from that those first early days mm. You know 19 like what what happened over that you know 15 year period, how did the business grow, sir evolve and mature okay um? Over the years, we’ve tried out different products, different price points, different marketplaces and kind of had to go along with the times and where the technologies have been moving from desktop to mobile, to free returns, return shippings, all things have the picture.
Quality has to be really amazing, especially if you’re selling a $ 5,000 item. So we started hiring photographers going to different, shows and vegas atlanta different places to to get new brands. That would be ready for online and at this time a lot of the malls and brands were opening their own storefronts kind of competing with us. That makes sense, and that made a lot of stores close so mom and pops.
It became rare to have like a native family-run business and let alone being online. The dynamic is a little different because you’re not touching the product you’re shipping instead, so it becomes like almost like a catalog business, but a lot of the brand’s want you to maintain store Franz. They want you to go to trade, shows and still be in person. So over the years we found this different, different marketplaces, repeat: customers, brands that resonated and we’ve evolved to today, where we’re we have our own website and we’re on many marketplaces which marketplaces we’re on Amazon, which is one of our better ones that we do most of Our business and it’s really strict stringent policies to maintain turnaround with email messaging to products being, as is, and exactly what you’re selling and we’re happy to do.
So because, where you are very honorable in what we do and sell – and we want all the customers to know and have that exact thing that they’re ordering, so we’re really proud of that, when did you first get onto Amazon Amazon? We started about five six years ago and it transformed our business yeah yeah we’re doing many more sales, our Christmas December time as fantastic, and it beats going to a store yeah, I’m sitting all day waiting for someone to walk in because we reach the whole world.
What differentiates you as a vendor online? What what makes you special? Yes couple things the way we curate our stuff, it’s like a gallery of items and we have a lot of limited edition pieces and we have new stuff. So we not only have this amazing piece still that might be from the special season from last season and no one has it anymore and that someone’s looking for it. But it’s new and it’s in the original packaging and it comes with all its wealth bill bells and whistles anything that it should come with.
So it’s a way that people can trust our goods with tags and dust bags and and we ship it beautifully as well, and and how does that translate online? You know like, like you know, when you’re dealing with such demanding customers, people who are used to going to the Four Seasons who are used to kind of having their every whim met. Yes, how does it like translate to e-commerce kind of impersonal? You know it could be, it could be.
I like that. I have contact and communication with these buyers and discussed they killed, call me or whoever and have someone actually pick up the phone they’re so shocked. It’S amazing when they call – and I actually pick up and explain, answer all their questions. They love it. So, there’s that level of intimacy and all and communication, which is key and it’s different than calling a department store and getting the runaround or being put on hold for 20 minutes or whatever yeah.
I that’s my favorite. The discerning client is a favorite of mine and developing that relationship and continuing it so that I know next season or the next collection that comes in that I can reach out to that person and they’ll be excited to hear from me. Is there a bit of that, like you might call or text or whatsapp sure, absolutely personalized, yeah cuz? That makes that differentiates me from I’m shopping somewhere else, yeah yeah.
That brings us to me. Yes, what in the world sounds like you’re, a very successful businesswoman? Well, thank you. You’Ve been able to kind of take a family business and bring it into the 21st century. What can i, what can busy do for you? Well, I had so many good recommendations and referrals to come to you and since the class I’ve met even more people that have taken your class and known you, and I find your class to be the next step for us in expanding the social media presence.
Utilizing Facebook, as the main cog in the wheel and seeing how that will translate onto because online sales is what we do I’d like that and I think you’re what you do is perfect for our business in translating a high-end fashion, easy capturable social presence into sales Were you feeling a little captive to Amazon? Perhaps yes, talk about that like what they’re sort of what give, I guess, maybe what giveth can be taken away? Is that sort of how it felt it just feels like? I don’t want to be tied down and I would like the potential to grow a similar business on my own.
That has that I’m in control of right and explain what that means. For someone who isn’t in the e-commerce business. What does it mean to be in control of Amazon? Requires you to use UPC codes to use certain product details, to update your the catalog to use certain images and it’s a very stringent business seller performance that they expect from you, which is fine and it keeps everyone up to par.
But certain things that I’d like to sell may not have a UPC code, but I love the designer from Columbia and I would love to use her products, but she doesn’t have that code so that limits what I can sell to the world. So I see working with you as a potential of expanding the online business, the bag, lady shop site and being able to sell other products that I adore and that I have limits with on Amazon yeah.
That’S definitely one really interesting limitation. I mean another one with Amazon is when folks go to an amazon landing page with your product. Yeah amazon owns that traffic cause the data about that traffic. They don’t share that data. They don’t let you track that customer. You can’t retarget that customer you’re really limited and absolutely with that yeah. So if someone visits that landing page with your product and doesn’t buy, you have no way of advertising to them again.
Yes, that’s a big one if they were to go and visit that same product on your homepage on your website. You could absolutely and so driving traffic from ads on facebook to your home page versus an Amazon landing page allows you for share our sales, 100 % and so part of what I think. The opportunity that you see is to kind of own your destiny. A little bit more yes and I adore that relationship. I want to be in touch with these customers, they’re, essentially mine, and I would like to have that discussion with them and send them newsletters and all the latest yeah.
It would be great – and I mean you know somebody who’s looking at a one or two or three thousand dollar bag isn’t necessarily going to buy on the first visit right. You know so so you can expect them to kind of shop around a little bit, and so it’s particularly important with that kind of purchase which isn’t going to be an impulse, buy that you’re able to have build up a relationship, and it’s very very hard to Do that on Amazon, absolutely Lilley captive to their world the other thing about Amazon that we talked a little bit about when we were first kind of getting to know each other is what I sort of mentioned to you.
Is that what Amazon giveth Amazon can taketh away? Yes, which is to say that Amazon will drive traffic to your product pages through their search? Yes, but they control everything. How much traffic you get, of course, and if they decide another vendor is who they want to get traffic to or that they’re going to start selling, which they do they compete with your own statistics. You know those bags themselves or a knockoff version, mm-hm or they’re going to make you start to pay for what you’re getting now for free.
All of those become inhibitors to your growth start and risks for your business yeah. So there’s just a lot of risk. That’S kind of built in to relying on any one digital blog for your company’s future, absolutely put all your eggs in one basket and it’s not to say that there aren’t risks associated with Facebook. It’S just that you’re diversifying the risk by. If you have a good blog going with Facebook and it’s generating you traffic there and you have Amazon and then you have eBay, and maybe you have some other blogs going as well and then you have direct traffic and you have the direct relationship yeah.
Then you have a diversified business that could survive if Amazon changes its policies or start sending you less traffic and so forth, and then you also as you explore these new blogs can grow. Yes, what have you learned so far that you think is going to make a difference for your business, because this is so retail focused? I adore the look-alike audience aspect of the Facebook campaign. What’S it look like audience good question, you utilize an existing targeted audience that you have data from and you filter it through and it they create a symbiotic audience.
That means I’m a similar to audience. Okay and I’m really a like the idea that I’m going to learn who my audience is, his Facebook is so massive and it goes from grandmother’s to tweens and all in between, and I’m really curious to see that, because that’s really that will tell me the next Phase of this adventure in business is who, targeting for I’ll, go and buy leggings for that tween. If that’s my new customer that I know is going to be purchasing for me.
So it’s a great tool. I’M really excited to learn that and get the data from the Facebook. You know that Facebook, you know, does someone who likes coach also, like Gucci, does it work that way or is someone who likes Gucci, also like whatever this is Mary friends Mary Francis? Are there like partisans, like somebody who likes this designer, doesn’t like that kind of group? Yes, it groups for sure, but it’s fashion.
So it’s multi-level and there’s something that you’ll do during the day that maybe on a weekend or an event that you’ll need something else or – and you have ideas about those groupings right just from years of experience, absolutely it’s a different population. Have you gone into audience, insights and tested those assumptions? I started a little bit, but I’m really excited to delve in there and it would be really fun yeah to do that yeah.
We could even do it together, but what we could do is Facebook. Has this amazing tool, it’s called audience insights and basically leverages the data from two billion people and you can put in their interests like Gucci. Yes and then you can see according to Facebook’s data people who, like Gucci, also tend to like X yeah, and we can actually test some of your knowledge. So you know what we might have to do when I have to do a little quiz, okay and see if we could like test you and see.
If, ladies I’m excited, I can pass the Facebook test uh-huh all right. So, let’s project forward. Okay, it’s graduation! Yes, you’re at the end of this first stage of your journey is hack. The end min is 12 12 week journey with us together. What do you imagine you’ll say to your fellow graduates as you’re, giving your graduation speech? Well, that’s a good projection. I hope everyone’s happy and healthy and growing in their business at that time and that we’ve made good relationships.
That will because to me that’s one of the most important things as the relationships with people. I love creating new ones and helping people need others and to bring traffic to the website. That’S the main goal and to translate that into sales. That would be the greatest right talk a little bit about some of the people. You’Ve met some of the peers, the the other business owners that you’ve met. Yes, I’ve met and know Julia who’s, a realtor.
I love the class also because it’s so varied with so many different types of people and types of industries and levels. So that’s been great. Anthony is selling products on Amazon as well, and he’s he’s was interesting to get to know. Carmen Tati is a great role model, there’s a lot of great people in the class, so how you know it’s possible that Amazon could go away tomorrow? You know how is busy at preparing you for that with digital marketing and media, there’s that blog through Facebook to get quality audience the same.
That Amazon captures the two billion that are on Facebook or would be captured with digital marketing, and I want to learn how to do that with your class properly and funnel that information and make it into great sales yeah. And I guess another way to talk about. It’S like right now. What percentage of your sales are coming through Amazon versus, say your website or eBay, a majority I’d say: 60 percent is an Amazon sale and if you could, if, in a in an ideal world, what percentage would be, what would your ideal percentage be website versus Amazon? 90 % website would be ideal, so right now, you’re at is it 40 % on your website or less less? What is it on your website minimal? Got it so right now: you’re like below 5 % on your website and 60 % on Amazon yeah, and your goal is to get to 90 % on your web absolutely and 10 % everywhere else.
Yes, so what is your plan to get from under 5 % to 90 %, starting with your cloths, and to see what that will bring and tapping into the market that Facebook has to offer and how will Facebook help you get there? How will Facebook help you get more sales directly on your website? I really think it’s a powerful tool because you can see the behaviors the interest capture their eyes in a way that in article and really targeted ways right and then drive them to your drive to the website and collect their contact information.
So you can stay in touch absolutely so I guess the the way that the path there is to use or leverage the audience on Facebook, sir, to make them aware of you, mm-hmm collect their contact, information yeah and then begin a direct selling relationship kind of the The idea – and I guess that’s what and that’s what biz hack is teaching you how to do absolutely great yeah I’ll get you there. I hope. So, although ninety percent – I don’t know well, let’s increase it yeah well, you know, what’s going to happen, is we’ll keep your ebay portion the same okay and we’ll make the other portions so large yeah.
Then it will just dwarf the existing. So your business will become massive. That would be fantastic. Then it will become like a hundred million dollar business. Can you imagine by the way, do you know of anyone else who’s doing what you’re doing? That’S the thing I am not in the you’re one of the first people in my new networking journey trying to meet like-minded entrepreneurs that are doing what I’m doing.
I know a few, but they also sell this bad back, and so I need to know, of course, many in the business, but not quite that are on Amazon, some sell, diaper mats that are organic things like that very specified. Not I don’t know anyone that has like a collection, so you don’t know another bag. Lady person, I know mmm, no, I don’t it’s pretty wild. Actually it is so what you’re doing seems like. Why aren’t there like a million bag? Ladies, I think there are, and they might not have the same collection or breath of online presence, or there may be relationships that you’ve developed that are hard to manage relationships, because these designers won’t necessarily make their collections available to those other folks.
It’S just varied. Some. Don’T have the storefront, some don’t have the connection, there’s different levels. Yeah, you know you’ve heard of drop shipping right. I love drop shipping and and you’re a but you’re, but you also have a large inventory, correct, yeah. How large is like in terms of dollars? How I couldn’t even but a lot Millions there’s dollars in there.
Welcome to the we are slam, show a show where we share marketing trends, best practices and ideas to help your business grow, and today I have with me Whitney Brockman. She is our art director here at slam agency and today we’re going to share some tips and some best practices on how to design for digital. Yes, I’m very excited stuff, yeah yeah.
So this is the type of stuff that Whitney does day in and day out, for slam and for our clients, and so I’m really excited, because this is a this is going to be some good information that you can use immediately. You can take back to your teams to your agencies and you can you can get some good work done so Whitney welcome to the show Thanks. So today we’re talking about best practices for designing and digital, and more than anything, we have to realize that print and digital are two completely different things.
Print in many cases is still relevant, but most of the design work is going digital at this point. So let’s talk about like, what’s the one, the big thing that people should keep in mind so traditionally the clients that I’m working with have been more towards the print side of design, and it’s been interesting to have them translate what they’ve been doing in print to Digital because it is dramatically different, there are limitations.
There are, you know, restraints that you can’t necessarily it doesn’t translate in digital world and you really have to grab the attention of the viewer and when I am given tasks and projects to work on, I really have to think about the big picture so like what It what’s the goal who’s going to see this who’s this for and if it’s a campaign, when is it going to end, so I can figure out the best way to get the most attention and engagement right off the bat and that that big picture is important Because, with print you know like a magazine ad or something like that, you’re designing it, it’s going through several different stages of iterations of you know.
Process might take a few weeks or a month to design going back and forth with the client and then at some point in the future. Like you see it in a magazine and that’s that right yeah, you can’t, if you see it once, you can’t necessarily go back and find it through all your magazines, but on social media. It is interesting because if you remember an ad, you can easily go find it with a lot of campaigns, you’re going to have multiple ads on multiple platforms.
So you can do those ads targeting your audience, and you know they’re going to see that over and over again, which is really great and that’s why you have to think about the big picture. It’S not just one ad. It’S not going to just be there for just one person to see and with a print ad. Typically, you want to include as much information as you can in the ad. Typically, that’s what we see a lot of, but in digital, like you, said, think of the big picture like that.
Storyline is constantly happening across different blogs different times, and you have opportunities to communicate that message over time. You don’t have to do it all at once and because, most of the time, the ads going to click through to a page where you can put all the information you want, so the driving factor is you just have to make it look good. You have to make it different. You can take risks because it’s a digital platform.
It’S like I said it’s only going to live for a couple days. You can take risks, that’s what’s important and that’s that’s one of the advantages of digital is that you can try new things and because and because of that – or you can do that, because you have essentially instant feedback built into each of the Train of flexibility. Yes, so like we post something on Facebook and instantly, we know whether or not that design and that copy is engaging and whether it’s having the effect we want it to have easy, well easily trackable.
You know if, if you have one post that you post one day and it’s getting all this feedback a lot of likes and comments and shares, you know they were doing right. But then you maybe post something very similar with a different image and you can see that it’s not engaging and you really got to sit down and you know dissect that feedback and figure out what makes one post better than the other. And we are talking a little bit earlier about just like this traditional process, which typically, you know, takes time yes and the digital process, which, because of the nature of digital, we are able to create content today and post it today and get our feedback today, and Because of that, you, you mentioned earlier to be quick, like don’t sit on ideas, especially when they’re relevant you know in this world we have things going viral every day and and you can’t wait a week if something’s gone viral, if you want to jump on board, You got to get going and figure out the best way for your team, or you know yourself to manage your time and get what needs to get out as fast as you can and because you have a format or a blog, where things only last.
For a couple of days, it’s okay! If it’s not perfect, right right exactly and if you make a mistake, you can delete it, which is nice. You can re-edit re-upload, so um. I think the thing that drives the most results is taking those risks within the brand guidelines, of course, of course, stay on stay on bran, but take those right and within the blogs guidelines. That’S probably the final point that we mentioned is that yeah, you mentioned a little bit earlier about advertising on Facebook and the 20 % rule, but just in general, every network is going to have some sort of guidelines right.
So it’s become second nature for me because I do it so much, but if you aren’t aware of especially with Facebook guidelines for advertising, there’s a limit for the amount of words that you can have on an ad. So it’s you want to really have the strong imagery making sure that your ads are going to be the most boosted and going to reach the the biggest audience there you go so Whitney. Thank you for sharing with us on how to design for digital.
If you have questions about how you should be designing for digital or just about designing in this day and age period, Whitney is going to be answering your questions on this article. So leave a comment, a question right below this article and we nee we’ll get back to you with an answer right away. So thank you for reading. We’Ll see you next time. Thank you. Thanks for reading, if you like what you just readed subscribe, then hit that Bell you’ll be the first to be notified when new content goes live.
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I get annoyed quite easily at bad data visualizations. I think it’s incredibly important to get it right to make sure using the right chart to make sure you format it correctly. You focus the attention right away. You remove all clutter so a lot of things going to building a good, visual and there’s a lot of things to consider.
What is the question that your audience might ask? Quad is the main message that you want the audience to take away when looking at your chart. So there’s a lot of things to to consider in order to make sure you build a good, visual and there’s already a ton of resources online. They talk about how important is the use of color the choice of the way you present your dashboard, the orientation of the dashboard, so a lot of a lot of things come come into play to build a good visual.
So I wanted to do a series of articles to kind of share my experience and give some ideas of how I like to address. Visualization and I am using real, live web performance website performance data and something that comes quite often in my line of work and something that I work with on a daily basis. So one of the things what you see in here is attend for website traffic. So really basic piece of data that actually can tell a lot about how the website is performing.
This is something that I do all the time. Usually I do looking at a period of 13 months or looking kind of year-over-year stacking of this role so for this example, I’m looking at a very simple wine chart that visualizes sessions through a website for a period of 13 months. So we can look at the beginning at the end of the of the line chart to compare year over year results, so this is built in Excel a fairly basic these days tool for data visualizations visualization, considering all the fancy tools that are available now.
I still think it’s great for building beautiful charts. So when you select data, this is, and you insert the line chart this is here. This example is how Excel is going to insert it. So this is the default, and this on the right is how I’ve worked around it. To make sure that I tell the story I want to tell with this and while this first example still shows a good upward trend for website traffic, there’s a lot of things that are cluttered so first, I always try to make sure I don’t make the audience Tilt their head so kind of aligning the horizontal axis so that it really aligns well – and it’s not tilted.
I’Ve included data labels on each data point which in this case is each month and when I include date, the labels. I always delete the vertical axis because I think it becomes really cluttered when we have two points of the same data I remove gridlines. I think they do add clutter in certain cases. They might be useful in this case. However, I think they would just add additional things to look at in this trap.
I always try to include a take away title and I’ve put a few annotations, so this is the one thing I really like about wine charts is that you can include annotations point to certain data points that are important and that you want the audience to look At immediately when they look at the chart, so this is really basic example of a line chart showing overall traffic to website. Another example that I see often is a line chart built for multiple categories.
If you want to look over time – as in this example right here, so I’m going to remove this to see the table with the data we’re looking again and website traffic by social media, and we want to compare how the traffic is, how these metrics are performing. Against each other, one thing I’ll be really careful is to not include more than three categories with the wine charts over the you know, chart that has more than three lines would become really cluttered tangled, and it would really be very hard to process.
So that’s why I’ve chosen an example with only three metrics in my second article next week. I will talk more about how you can handle data, where you have a lot more categories that you want to look at over time with the line chart. So this example here is what Excel inserts by default, and this is something that I’ve tried to rework. So I haven’t added a title here. This is something that you can consider depending again on what you want to tell with this data.
I have decided to use the axis rather than data labels, because with a few lines between each other, it will be hard to be certain numbers. So I have chosen to clean that and use an access and in terms of legend, I have put all this. The names of each social network, social media network at the end, so it’s very easy when someone’s looking at it to see the performance and not kind of look at the line, then look at the legend to make sure they’re looking at the right color.
So in this way it just makes it easier to follow the trend for each of the categories that you’re comparing. You can obviously be a little bit more careful with color and choose different colors. You might want to point a specific one with color, so what I think the takeaway here is from what I’m seeing is Facebook performing really well going up for the past 13 months, while the other social networks have experienced the dip.
So, in this case, you might want to analyze, what’s happened and what has changed in terms of compete are getting on those two social media networks. The other chart that I use a lot – and it comes very often handy and it’s probably my favorite chart – is bar charts and column charts. So here in this example, I have a single category bar chart. I’M going to move a little bit this, so I have two sets of data here that I want to talk about a little bit so in this first one we’re looking at users to the website for each day of the week summarized for the month, and in This case, I would rather have the data sorted by the way the category flows so the way the week goes Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and so on, rather than sort by the number of users.
So there are a few use cases like that. You might want to look at hour of day again sorted by the progression of the hours or maybe age group again, this may go in a progression, so be careful what your data and how its structured and how you want to sort it. So in this example, I’m sorting by the category the way the days of the week flow in the second example, which is this chart right here – we’re looking at users to the website by social network and since social networks don’t go in a certain order.
I’Ve sorted this data by the number of users April to the website, so this is what Excel inserts by default when you click to insert column chart, rather in this case vertical bars – and this is what I’ve done with it. Using some formatting I’ve included a take away title I’ve chosen to highlight the day. That’S brought the most users to the website. You might not necessarily want to do that, but depending again on what you want to see with the chart, this could be a good idea to choose a highlighting color for the best performing or the worst performing category.
So the second example we looking at users by social media, so this here is what Excel inserts by default. When you choose a horizontal bar turn slightly first, the metrics – I haven’t highlighted them in this case, just because they are sorted already by the doc performing social media network again, depending on what you doing, and what do you want your report ones to focus on? You? Might want to choose to highlight the top one and I’ve included a takeaway title, so I’ve used a few that I’ve removed this axis so really trying to clean the charts to make sure it.
It looks good and is kind of right to the point. So other circumstances using a bar chart is, if you have multiple categories so like in these examples here and again I have by week and by marketing blog. The data by we looking at the day of the week is sorted by the way. The days go for marketing blogs, we’re looking at the top performing one altogether, so we are looking at blog subscriptions and use like the subscriptions on the website, and with this with the blog ones, I’ve included a total column where I’ve summed all the both of these Metrics so that I can sort by the one that performs best overall, not by a particular conversion type.
So let’s look at this day of the week. This is how Excel inserts it by default. This is what I have tried to do with with this chart. So I’ve chosen a color. There is software, for you know, kind of is the same color, it’s just different intensity. Just so it’s kind of I I think it looks better. I don’t want, otherwise it becomes really distracting when it’s bar charts and you kept to come. Look at two bar charts at a time for the same category and I’ve decided to keep the ledge and there’s a few things you can do depending on how long the names of those metrics are.
You might include them here at the beginning and get rid of get rid of the legend so that it’s again removing an export, an extra clutter, so here it in the bottom example, where we’re looking at those same conversions by blog. This is how Excel will inserted by default. Again, I have put their categories in the first order, and I decided to use a stacked bar chart and I think, with horizontal charts, horizontal bar charts, gaghe bars can actually look really good, especially if you only have two categories.
If you have more than two, it can become a little too colorful. Depending on how you keep you know, there’s ways you can look at formatting of those colors and choosing columns wisely. I have a article about that also coming up, so I’m going to talk more about how you can visualize with stacked bars, so in this again kind of the same concept and what I forgot to do here, I’m going to do it right now is to point Which color is what conversion so I’m going to use a text box I’m going to choose, although it’s sitting on top of it, I will still try and use the same color as the bar.
The color of the bar yes, and I’m going to can choose the colour of the border and hold it in this case. You can go all the way down and include these on top of each one kind of again, depending really on how you want to build your visual. I think I’m going to leave it like that. I think that’s pretty straightforward and easy to understand what we’re talking about for the rest of the chart, so I’m going to leave those right here and only appearing at the top.
So I hope this was useful and gave you some good ideas on how to approach data visualization for this. These two basic chart types that I find myself using very very often, and they come really handy when you load in a digital marketing, company, dashboard or website performance dashboard. I have a few articles coming up that I’m going to talk about more about the stag bar charts and how you can approach this.
If you have multiple categories more than two, how you can visualize how you know how you can avoid? Rather, a line chart that uses more than three categories so that you can avoid the tangling in the clutter of so many chart, charts and lines. Sorry whines. Well, I hope this was useful and thank you for reading and also join me. The next few weeks as I’ll, be publishing more articles on how you can tell a story with data using Excel.
The wrong way, you know, they’re doing automation, tools they’re like no. You know that’s easy. I can just schedule the stuff out you’ll.
Basically we forget about it, but you know the three C’s of being. You know content consistency. Community community is the most important, even though it’s a third one, because without it for a brick and mortar business, you know you’re in person. If you don’t have a community around your business like it can be transactional, it can be like okay, I sell here got ill there, but after a while people going to be like well, what makes you guys different from the big chain, not much weight.
You know. So it’s the same thing with online communities is like you’re not connecting with the people, and I feel like a lot of businesses they think of it as being more. They think of social media like it’s just a online connection, thanks yeah now yeah, I’m an extension of TV radio, although traditional marketing out there, but it’s like it’s – definitely not that you can have a two-way conversation with their customer, even clients, and they want that yeah.
They want that because, like even for me as a consumer like when I reach out to you especially a local business – and you don’t respond to my call – okay well they’re all about talking about, though you know they’re about community and all that stuff guys, they don’t Fall through with that to where it’s like, okay, I get so excited with my favorite brands. All share my like we’ll retweet, nothing like.
If I take a picture of my food, you know and they retweeted I’m like. Oh my god, they did. Are you going to fail yeah under you, especially when they do that you’re? Like oh right, I’ve had some really fun conversations with like there’s. This bee bee vomit honey company? Okay, like what’s going on yeah – and I remember having this funny conversation with somebody where we shared an article about how honey is bee vomit, oh and they started in our conversation they joined in the conversation they were like.
It really is see ya. Well, I mean what right there is this build credibility, their business to to wear like you know, you’re, not just making up stuff and they’re, not just standing behind being silent, be like yeah sure just wait, you know, can I think they’re like yeah they’re participating in It as a person but, like you know, that’s the entity itself to where it’s like. You have a voice yeah the business online.
You know you do have a voice to where it’s like. You got ta talk with people, but you also got to make sure that you know when they ask you questions you respond so much about oh, hey, next special here and next special dare and oh come to our event kind. I think it’s like it’s not so much about the broadcasting so yeah, that’s part of it. It’S just that. You need to make sure that you’re having the conversation to told you’re, thriving online community and then in the end, it’s like yeah.
You might have 500 followers, but they’re 500 in games Paul, you know versus a million followers who don’t even know who that you exist. They’Re like based in other countries, they’re never going to buy from here, they’re just like Auto liking. Everything autocon think this is great. You know it’s like muffin, so it’s all about authenticity, yeah. I can appreciate that I feel like the online world is it’s very different than any other type of advertising and I feel like you, can’t really look at it as advertising.
If you want to be successful with it yeah, you have to really view it as something different as more of a relationship. You know customer relationship, management or customer relationship building platform versus looking at it like an advertising platform. Yeah, it’s all about the storytelling. I mean it’s just about just being real, like people are trying to flip that front up being like I’m like this or you know the business there being like.
I’M like this, but if they’re just they’re not telling a compelling story, people don’t know they’re. Just like. Okay, I’m going to go on to the next coffee shop or the next, whatever you know yeah, so what’s your favorite tip for businesses, small or large, and I want to start really cultivating a community for their business on social media. Well, I mean I guess especially for Twitter, but you can do it on Instagram and other networks as well.
Is that you know just think of what you want to listen for other business um? So you know twitter and instagram has the hash, hash tags and stuff. So you know, listen for or you know, put up search terms for people, for you know terms that basically would search 404, your business so, for example, pizza company. Yes, people are like I’m hungry or they use the pizza emoji. You know you could you’ll see what they’re talking about with their friends through that or you can just even pop in and be like.
Hey. You want pizza, we’re down the street from you I mean that’s that gets a little borderline CLD. You are so cute. It’S also you’re being a little more active in that way to where you’re not waiting for them to come to you right, so our people start doing that. Is it just like going to Twitter and searching or you can go through Twitter and search. You can also use tweetdeck, which is owned by Twitter.
Okay, of course, you know that’s more than what we can talk about this yep. I you know people want to reach out out to us and talk about it, and just have me do a tutorial. I can do that. Okay, awesome yeah. I know you do lots of workshops and things like that yeah well, thank you so much Helene for those amazing tips and helping people to understand the importance of building communities on social.
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