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Article URL: https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/creatoros-questbook/jobs/3DHDEnz-golang-backend-engineer
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Nebraska coach Scott Frost said Saturday’s 30-22 loss at Illinois ‘looked like the same movie’ after the Cornhuskers committed the same mistakes that have plagued them in recent years.
The post Nebraska's season-opening loss 'the same movie' appeared first on Buy It At A Bargain – Deals And Reviews.
How did I get over 942,000 subscribers without spending money on ads? Plus I am not famous, I’m not funny and I’m not a male model. 😉
I use a formula and it works well to get more YouTube subscribers for any industry and any account.
Even my clients at my marketing agency are using it and it’s working wonders for them. So much so most of them have over 100,000 subscribers now.
Now before I teach you how to get more subscribers, let me give you a quick overview…
There’s a simple formula that I go into this article to getting more YouTube subscribers (which you can read below.
If you want to learn formula in-depth just keep reading below and I will go over what I just covered above. Or if you want the short version you can also watch the video below.
Before you do anything, you need to give your channel a theme.
If you look at many of the top YouTube channels, you’ll notice that many of them stick to a theme.
Take a look at Derek Halpern‘s channel, for example.
Notice how a lot of the YouTube videos he creates are on topics related to business and success.
Having a theme makes it easier to create consistent YouTube content.
On top of that, you can make your channel the ‘go-to’ place for specific content. This is the goal of a social media platform.
If your channel caters to a specific niche, then people who care deeply about that niche will want to become subscribers.
For example, imagine your videos are all about Facebook marketing, and you aim to help business owners.
If a business owner who wants to learn more about Facebook marketing subscribes to your YouTube channel, they’ll get an update any time you post content.
This helps them stay ahead of the curve without having to do a lot of work.
If you’re struggling to come up with a theme for your channel, think about the problems your business solves and who it solves those problems for.
Then, produce videos based on the topics you know will help the people your business serves.
Many marketers agree that video converts better than other forms of media.
If you want to drive conversions, you need to learn how to create incredible content on your media platform.
Plus, if you can create incredible content, then a lot of the work related to growing your subscriber count is already done.
When people subscribe to your channel, they’re essentially signing up to get updates whenever a new piece of content is posted.
If your content is great, people won’t mind hearing from you again because their initial interaction with you and your content was positive.
Whether that’s a learning experience, an entertainment experience, or both — it’s worth watching your videos.
And remember that people take the time to watch great content.
According to Hubspot, 54% of people want to see more video content from marketers. This is a good foundation for your media platform that will expand social networks.
If your content is excellent, then you’ll benefit from the fact that 54% of senior executives share content with their social networks.
So how do you produce incredible content that makes viewers want to subscribe and share?
Start by focusing on producing content that is relevant to your target audience.
Provided that you’re sticking to a theme, as mentioned before, it shouldn’t be too hard to come up with a way to produce valuable content.
Then, use these tips.
Let’s say that you want to create a channel that covers the topic of ‘pencil drawing.’
One way to develop content ideas is by simply entering the broad keyword of ‘pencil drawing’ into the YouTube search engine.
YouTube is the second-largest search engine globally, so we know there’s going to be some relevant data here.
When we type in the keyword, we see the suggestions above.
Now, those topics might seem a little broad, so you may want to pick one of those keywords and go through the same process again so that you can generate something more concise.
Let’s add the word ‘tutorial,’ for instance.
By adding the word tutorial, we are now provided with more concise keywords.
The fact that these keywords appear in the suggestions lets us know that people are searching for these videos.
You might argue that there is a lot of competition for such keywords.
And while that may be true, later on in the post, we’ll figure out how we can get people to view our videos, even when there is a lot of competition — so don’t let it be a concern for now.
The great thing about the approach above is that it gives us a place to start.
If we want to produce content for a certain niche, this technique lets us know what kinds of content people will already have an interest in viewing.
My tool Ubersuggest is another great YouTube keyword research tool. Simply type in your main key term and click “Keyword ideas” in the right sidebar, and it will deliver more than 400 keywords for you to consider.
You can also use the Google Keyword Planner tool to come up with content ideas. That’s because there will be some coherence between Google search results and YouTube search results.
Let’s stick with the topic of ‘pencil drawing.’
In the ‘Your product or service’ box, enter a keyword-based on your business. If I were running a business that taught people how to do a pencil drawing, I’d enter ‘how to do a pencil drawing.’
You want to keep the keyword broad at this stage because it’ll allow for the keyword tool to develop a wide range of ideas for you.
Once you’ve entered the keyword, you’ll then see this page. It shows several ‘Ad groups’ of keywords.
Each group of keywords centers around a certain topic.
As you can see, I’ve arranged the groups in terms of ‘Average monthly searches’ and descending order. This gives us a sense of where there might be a lot of competition.
Let’s click on the mid-range group called ‘Drawing Techniques.’
I’ve highlighted a few keywords that might represent good YouTube content opportunities.
I chose these keywords because it’s clear to see how you could create a focused, high-value video centered around these keywords.
You might think that these keywords don’t have that many searches and, therefore, aren’t worthy in terms of effort required.
However, remember we’re not just going to post a handful of videos and then be done with it.
Cultivating a YouTube channel so that it eventually has many subscribers often requires posting a lot of content. In fact, the biggest YouTube channel has over 4,200 videos.
If you want to publish massive amounts of content while keeping it relevant, you need to be able to niche down your content as much as possible, so each video provides value.
If you niche down, it’s only natural that the level of searches per month will go down.
Even if you focus on low-volume keywords, they’ll all come together to help you build momentum and establish yourself in a YouTube niche.
You’ll also notice there isn’t a ton of content for those lower volume search terms, which represents an opportunity.
Look at what happens when I type in the ‘Simple drawing techniques’ keyword.
There’s a playlist there, but other than that, there aren’t any fully optimized titles or even videos based solely around the topic of ‘simple drawing techniques.’
Production quality shouldn’t be a top priority, but it can definitely increase the number of YouTube subscribers after a certain point.
As long as your videos are rich in value and provide the viewer with the information they need, you’re doing a good job.
When the videos start to bring you a return, then you can focus more on production quality.
Here are a few tips.
Ensure what you’re saying can be easily heard. You must speak clearly and enthusiastically. You’ve got to project your voice.
Otherwise, people might not be able to understand what you’re saying. They might even get bored.
You don’t need to act like an extrovert; just try and prevent your voice from becoming monotonous.
If you’re recording your content using a phone or a laptop, the microphone might not be enough. So, you may want to invest in a quality external microphone.
However, test it to see how things actually sound before you make this investment.
You also need to ensure that your video is easy to watch.
You don’t want to make it hard work for your viewers to see what is going on. This means you need to ensure lighting is adequate.
If you’re recording a talking head style video where you’re talking to the camera, ensure that your face can be clearly seen.
If someone is recording you, then ensure the camera isn’t shaking.
If you’re recording your laptop screen, make sure your actions can be clearly seen and that anything you type can be read.
When it comes to video editing, you have a couple of solutions. When speaking about video editing, what we’re referring to is improving your videos’ style and not so much about removing minor mistakes.
More often than not, you’re going to make minor mistakes when recording your video. You don’t need to put tons of focus into removing these bits, as they don’t harm your video all that much.
In fact, they might even help your video as they let other people know that they’re dealing with a real person rather than a sly media marketing salesman.
Where editing can come in handy, though, is when you need to create cuts in your video or add a title screen.
If you’re not an accomplished video editor, you could seek someone from Upwork or perhaps even Fiverr.
Alternatively, you could purchase a video editing suite and learn to do everything yourself.
That method might save you a bit more money, though you might end up spending a lot more time learning how to edit videos on your own. This takes time away from your media marketing.
That might not be the best trade-off, depending on your circumstances.
As mentioned, you don’t want to over-edit your videos, though you want to give them a sense of style that separates you from the crowd.
Often, the easiest way to do this is by having custom intro music and a custom title screen.
Another way that you can post incredible content is by creating videos based on your product being used.
Demonstration videos can go a long way in showcasing your product as something worth buying.
You can even turn some of your blog posts into videos. Nearly 59% of executives would rather watch a video than read a chunk of text.
Okay, so that’s the basics of creating incredible content.
The next point will be essential if you want to ensure that your YouTube subscriber rates grow consistently over time.
This is probably the hardest part of growing a YouTube following — though it can also be one of the most important.
The average company posts 18 YouTube videos a month. Posting content consistently is a great way for you to compete.
Plus, if you’re constantly posting new content, then people have a reason to become a subscriber and share it on their social networks.
After all, people are less likely to subscribe if you’re not going to post any more content — why should they?
If you use the tips mentioned earlier, then coming up with ideas for posting new content is pretty easy.
You just need to set a schedule and stick to it.
If you want to keep things simple, look at what your competition is doing, and then one-up them. If they are posting twice a week, aim for three times a week.
Sometimes, however, the best plan is the one you can stick to.
Consistency in your media marketing campaign is important, as it’ll keep existing subscribers coming back for more. This will result in more YouTube views — and also improve engagement.
Engagement on a video tends to come in the following forms:
Ideally, you want to improve the engagement levels in each of these categories through any social media site.
People like to engage with content on YouTube; did you know that over 100 million people per week take a ‘social action’ on YouTube every week?
Another mind-blowing fact is that 700 videos are shared every minute on Twitter. So while YouTube is not a social media site, it is a valuable tool for any social media marketing platform.
Great engagement will help make the video more visible in the YouTube search engine.
This will expose your video to more people, who can then become subscribers themselves.
If you want to view some statistics in terms of how your videos perform, you can use the YouTube analytics dashboard.
You don’t have to be at a computer to post content consistently. That’s because you can use the scheduling feature provided by Google.
To gain access to this feature, you must first turn on monetization for your videos. This means that you are willing to show ads on your videos.
If you don’t want to show ads on your videos, don’t worry. You still have control over which videos are monetized and which ones aren’t.
Let’s take a look at how you can get that done.
Now, you’ll be able to access the scheduling features provided by YouTube to program your media platform.
You’ll also be able to access a lot more in the way of YouTube analytics.
If you want to schedule a video, click on the ‘Upload’ button.
Then click on the dropdown menu and select the ‘Scheduled’ option.
Then drag and drop your video, or click the icon to upload it.
On the next screen, you can adjust the scheduling options.
Now enter the date and time you want the video to go live.
If people are subscribed to your channel, they’ll get a message when your video goes live.
Make sure to schedule that date into your social media management platform, if you have one. This will ensure that Tweets, Facebook updates, and LinkedIn posts are sent out simultaneously.
If you have an email list relevant to your video, you might even want to send a message out to those folks.
Consider staggering the messages, so you’re not bombarding people on multiple platforms all at once.
If you’re struggling to develop content ideas daily, consider splitting up longer videos into several shorter ones.
In long videos, you likely cover several points about one main topic.
You could edit out certain topics and then create mini videos using those topics. Shorter videos are more convenient for social network sharing.
In fact, Hubspot found that 2 minutes is the optimal video length on YouTube for their audience.
You’ll notice that the channel ‘Inside Quest’ does this a lot. Here’s one of the videos on their channel. Note how it is nearly 49 minutes long:
For someone new to the channel, that video length can be pretty intimidating.
So, they have broken down the video into some ‘highlight clips,’ covering interesting points and topics.
Note how short each of these videos is — just around a minute.
Short videos can be a great way to introduce people to your channel by giving them a taste of your content and building your media marketing campaign.
A great way to consistently generate subscribers is by creating evergreen content.
These are videos that will be relevant whether they are viewed today or five years in the future.
This will apply to some niches more than others.
For example, I spoke earlier about the pencil drawing business, which naturally lends itself to producing a lot of evergreen content. A video about Instagram marketing, however, might be out of date in five years.
Take a look at your niche and see if you can create ‘how-to’ videos that will stand the test of time.
Even if you’re not looking to create evergreen content, it’s worth creating ‘how-to’ videos to provide value.
Before anyone can become a subscriber to your channel, they need to first click on your videos.
No matter how good your video is, once it is seen in the YouTube search engine or sidebar, it will have some competition in the form of other videos.
So how do you get people to pay attention to and click on your video?
You need to focus on three areas — the headline, the thumbnail, and the description.
These three elements will have the biggest impact on influencing YouTube users to click on your videos. Be sure the meta tag is relevant and includes key points.
This is because they’ll help your rankings in the YouTube search engine. They’ll also improve your videos’ ability to entice users to click on them and share them on social media.
YouTube categories and cards can also drive clicks, so we’ll cover those too.
If your video is based on a certain keyword, then the video’s title must include this keyword.
When you do this, you increase the chances of someone clicking on your video.
If the video’s title matches what they were searching for, they’ll assume that the video covers everything that they need to know about that topic.
Of course, that doesn’t mean that you should be ridiculous in how you’re creating your titles.
‘Keyword stuffing’ can hurt you much more than it can help you.
One way you can get around this problem is by using a colon.
For instance, earlier, we identified the keyword — ‘simple drawing techniques.’
If we had a video on that topic, we could write the headline like this — ‘Simple drawing techniques: 5 tips that will make drawing easier.’
Side note: An interesting experiment might be to split the ‘simple drawing techniques’ title into separate niches. This is a common social media marketing technique for blogs and helps videos too.
For example, ‘simple drawing techniques for cars’ or ‘simple drawing techniques for eyes.’
This is a great example of how you can take a big niche or keyword that is receiving a lot of traffic and identify opportunities within that niche.
As I mentioned, you’ll have to experiment a little when you do things this way. But, there’s no telling what kind of opportunities you might uncover.
As you can see in the example above, the video title uses a colon to separate the text.
You’ll also notice that there are videos where the ‘|’ symbol is being used.
You’ll have to test which one works better, though it could just be that this symbol serves a similar purpose to what the colon would have done.
When it comes to creating YouTube headlines, you’ll want to follow the rules that already exist for blog posts.
You need to have a mix of something that people are searching for and something that grabs their attention. This is core media marketing that can lead to social network inclusion.
You can do that by using the keyword your video targets in the headline and then including power words in the gaps.
As we’ve discussed, the style of your videos is going to influence the headline. If you have a ‘how-to’ video, then you’ll need to account for that in your headline.
Similar to blog post headlines, numbers also tend to work well in YouTube headlines.
When it comes to the thumbnail, there are a couple of approaches that you could take.
The first is to show a clear image of whatever the video is about. For example, if you’re talking about a laptop, you’d want to include a picture of a laptop.
Like this:
Alternatively, you could just show a picture of a person interacting with whatever the video is about.
Like this example:
However, one of the increasingly powerful ways of creating video thumbnails is by adding text, like this:
Don’t just drop some text and call it good. You can also heavily edit the thumbnail image so that it clearly stands out.
Here’s another one:
If you want to create thumbnails like this, you need to follow these rules.
You can create a thumbnail using Canva.
If you want to learn more about using Canva, going through their initial setup process might be helpful.
They have a YouTube thumbnail template, so use that to get started.
If you have some images of your own, you can upload them and then overlay text onto them.
I’ve just gone with the option of creating a basic thumbnail from scratch. Obviously, you can create something much better than this.
If you want to upload a custom thumbnail for a video, just go through the normal upload process.
On the page where you can adjust the video information, pick the ‘Custom thumbnail’ option.
You’ll then have a custom thumbnail that will be shown around the YouTube platform.
Creating a description for your YouTube videos could become an entire post in itself. We’re going to cover the basics here.
You need to keep in mind that you have a lot of space here, and YouTube tends to use what you say to rank your content. Don’t ignore the meta tag and its importance.
The first couple of lines on your description should be written so that they are easy to read in the search results.
Here’s a great example.
In this section, you may want to use some of the keywords you used in your title. That way, you can ensure that it has some coherence. This will also improve the ranking ability of your video.
When people click on your video, they have the option to click on the ‘Show More’ text.
This will expand the description. You can use this space to insert a ‘subscribe to channel’ link.
If you want to do that, use the following link format: https://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=
Make sure that you enter your channel name after the ‘=.’
So, for Kissmetrics, it would be: https://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=Kissmetric
When people click on this link, they’ll be taken to your channel page, where a subscribe box will pop-up.
You can also enter some other information, such as your other social media profiles, important links, and even your content posting schedule in the description.
You can also describe the things that are being discussed in your video, like this —
You could even highlight what is discussed at certain time sections in your video like this: 21:48 – How to prevent your website from being penalized by Google.
These timestamps will actually take those who click on them directly to the specified location in the video.
It’s also important to add tags. This will help improve the chances of your video appearing in the YouTube search engine.
You don’t want to use anything that is misleading here. Have a mix of some really specific tags that describe your video. Then, add a few broad tags that are still related to the genre.
There’s no harm in using some of the suggested tags provided by YouTube, as long as they align with what your video is actually about.
YouTube Annotations used to be the best way to engage users by directly adding links and other content to your video.
However, annotations were disruptive and were discontinued and then deleted in 2019.
Today, you have the option of using YouTube cards. You can add up to five cards to your video with a customized image, text, and call to action.
Here’s how you would go about creating a ‘YouTube card’ for your video.
Select the ‘Video’ option inside of the ‘Video Manager.’ Then click on the ‘Edit’ drop-down menu for the video you want to add a card to.
Then select the ‘Cards’ option.
You should then see this screen.
Click on the ‘Add card’ option and then choose the ‘Channel.’
Then, enter your channel name and add text.
The teaser text is the text that appears on the little graphic that appears in the video.
Here is how it will look:
If you want to adjust when the card displays the ‘teaser text,’ adjust the slider below.
You’ll notice, however, that the ‘i’ will always be visible in the video.
If people hover their mouse cursor over the ‘i,’ they’ll see the following.
This card will also appear at the time that you have chosen above.
Clicking on this will take users straight to your YouTube channel. However, no subscriber box will pop-up.
Another way to boost your YouTube subscriber numbers is by engaging with your audience and creating a community.
There are several ways that you can do this.
Responding to comments is a simple — but effective — way to engage users. This will show YouTube viewers that you value their opinion. Plus, the fact that you’re going through this effort might encourage them to subscribe.
You could even argue that this counts as customer service work that improves the customer experience.
When you look at it through that lens, you use the fact that 22% of people post positive things on social networks about a company after having previously posting something negative — all because they got a response.
If you’re getting any negative comments on your YouTube videos, address them promptly.
This can increase YouTube subscribers because people see this interaction and appreciate the fact that you engage.
You can do this using Google Hangouts on Air or YouTube Live. You might even just ask at the end of a video for viewers to post their questions in the comments section.
Then, in the next video, you could spend some time going through the questions you received.
Another way to engage your audience is by creating videos based on what they want. For example, you could use a survey to ask your audience what they want to see you talk about.
You can then create a video based on a viewer’s suggestions and call them out in the video to say thank you.
When it comes to boosting subscriber numbers, you also have the option of doing collaborations with people in your industry.
Collaborations can massively boost your video marketing efforts.
If you go about things in the right way, you may just end up joining the 18% of companies that regard their video marketing as ‘very successful.’
The best way to go about this is to find channels with a similar audience.
Both of you could then arrange an event where you can both benefit from the interaction.
When you collaborate, you must encourage people to subscribe to your channel.
Also, make sure the videos you publish immediately after the collaboration are amazing, so they want to subscribe.
Alternatively, consider doing interviews on your channel. If you can find a way to interview the top people in your niche, you’ll be able to attract their audience to your channel.
When your channel has a decent number of subscribers, you’ll have a greater ability to attract these opportunities.
Of course, you shouldn’t let low subscribers be an impediment that stops you from trying.
Email a few people who might be worth having on your channel and ask them if they’d be willing to be a guest.
If they say no, respectfully ask if they’d be willing to do a show when your channel has more subscribers. See if they can provide you with a ballpark figure that they’d be happy with.
You don’t want to be rude, but there’s nothing wrong with asking for a potential future way to make it happen.
I’ve already spoken extensively about using YouTube Ads.
To get the most out of ads, target keywords your videos are created around.
This will ensure that your videos appear at the top of the search results when people enter that keyword.
If you are just getting started, you might want to get a feel for the platform first. But, if you’ve got a solid YouTube monetization plan, ads can be an effective way to drive subscribers and YouTube views.
You need at least 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours in a year to make money off YouTube videos.
You can become successful as YouTuber by employing strategies such as producing great content, optimizing your YouTube videos for the algorithm, and sharing your videos across multiple social channels.
You can make money from YouTube by publishing popular videos that run ads; becoming an affiliate; offering paid memberships; and more.
You can get YouTube subscribers by creating videos on pop culture and tie them to your niche; optimizing your videos for the YouTube search algorithm; posting and promoting your videos across multiple channels; and simply asking viewers to subscribe.
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Ignoring the potential on YouTube is a huge mistake.
One of the keys to consistent success on YouTube is increasing your subscriber count — but don’t fall victim to those buy YouTube subscribers scams.
Instead, work to create exceptional content that will keep your audience coming back for more.
Then, make people want to click on your content using brilliant thumbnails and killer headlines that draw them in.
When people finally click on your video, then you can ask for a subscription.
Once you’ve got those fundamentals down, you’re free to experiment with things like collaborations and YouTube Ads.
If you put enough effort in, you’ll see those subscriber numbers start climbing — which can lead to website clicks and more.
All you need to do is get started!
What have you found to be useful when it comes to boosting subscriber numbers on YouTube?
A conversion funnel is a visual representation of the stages in a buyer’s journey, from the moment they land on your page until they complete a purchase. How do you create a conversion funnel, though, and how do you get the most from this tool? Let’s take a look.
The AIDA model is the traditional way to track the customer journey. It’s based on the four classic stages people move through during the buying process: awareness, interest, desire, and action.
Realistically, not everyone who visits your website will convert to a paying customer, which is why we use a funnel shape. Based on the AIDA model, then, a traditional-style sales marketing funnel might look something like this:
The problem? This is a rigid and fairly unrealistic way to view how people move through the stages of a sales cycle.
Leads are human, and the sales process is rarely linear. Often, people loop back to different stages in the sales cycle before they’re ever ready to complete the sale. In other words, people need nurturing before they’ll buy a product. As a marketer, you must understand their behaviors, their personalities, and their needs to convert them into paying customers.
Rather than a straightforward sales funnel, you need a more flexible conversion-based funnel, which will look something like this:
Don’t let the graphic intimidate you! While you might be tempted to start with a simple sales funnel, you’ll increase your chances of success if you start with a more flexible conversion funnel. Let me take you through exactly how it’s done.
There are nine main steps to creating a successful conversion funnel, based on a blend of AIDA and less restrictive techniques.
The point of a conversion funnel is to build an effective buyer’s journey and increase your conversions. To increase your conversions, you must first identify your starting point and your end goal. In other words, you must identify three things:
Once you’ve identified what your end goal is, you can map it out as a conversion funnel. Visualizing or mapping out your funnel can help you stay on track further down the line.
Think of your funnel in three separate parts: the top, middle, and bottom.
Decide what you want from each stage of the funnel; for example, maybe you want to increase your traffic at the top of the funnel, boost your engagement rate in the middle, and increase your conversions at the end.
Once you’ve set some concrete goals, consider using tools to track your progress and ensure you’re meeting those objectives. For example, you might use Google Analytics or email automation software to measure your success rates.
Unless you’re clear on what you need from each stage in your funnel, it’s impossible to know if you’re meeting your targets. Spend some time reflecting on your overall goal before you build a conversion funnel.
Each part of the funnel (top, middle, bottom) requires its own marketing plan to keep prospects moving from one stage to the next.
The first stage is all about building brand and product awareness. You’re trying to generate some buzz and encourage prospects to learn more about your company and how your products can help them.
At this early stage, use visually engaging content such as videos, short blog posts, and social media posts to introduce your company and emphasize your brand story.
You have a person’s attention, so now it’s time to gain their trust and show them why they need your product.
A prospect could ultimately be in this stage for a while, so the focus should be on creating valuable, informative, and reliable content such as case studies, video tutorials, and downloads.
The final stage should be focused on giving prospects a reason to buy your product, sign up for your service, or take any other action you desire. Marketing strategies at this stage could include free trials, actionable emails, and CTAs, or calls to action.
At this first stage in your funnel, you’re trying to build hype around your brand and product. Why should a customer care about your company? How do your products solve the problems they have? Answer these questions to help build a content strategy for this stage.
Do some competitor research, too. Consider what you can learn from their landing pages, social media channels, and blogs. How are they reeling in potential customers?
With all these questions in mind, here are some examples of ways you might generate awareness and create appropriate content for the first stage of a conversion funnel.
Other ways you might build interest in your brand include, for example, trying influencer marketing, hosting interviews, creating informational guides, and designing printable checklists.
While the AIDA model labels “interest” and “desire” as two separate outcomes, in real terms, they’re the same thing.
Generating interest, or building desire, comes down to one key thing: creating compelling content. You build some awareness around your brand, you show people why they “need” what you’re selling, and as a result they decide they “want” your product.
How do you create great content to nudge people along this stage of your funnel? Here are some ideas.
There are some other ways you can generate interest, too, such as starting a podcast, creating some product guides, running a free trial program, or offering product samples.
At the end of the funnel, your goal is to convert a lead into a customer by encouraging the required action. While you could skip this step in the funnel if it works for your business, here are some ways you might optimize your strategy for this stage.
Put together some valuable content in a PDF download and offer it in exchange for their contact details. Make sure your document promises to answer common questions your customers have, to encourage them to actually download it.
Here’s an example from LegalSuite, a legal services provider. Their customers typically want help with streamlining their operational efficiency. To help their customers, LegalSuite offers a free eBook with ways to make their legal operations run more efficiently.
The catch? Prospects must provide some contact details, which means that LegalSuite can follow up with them:
This is a great example of how to encourage an action without being pushy.
CTAs clarify the action you want people to take, so don’t forget to add them to the content you create.
At this stage of the funnel, you’re trying to entice customers to take a final step to complete the cycle, so give your CTAs a sense of urgency. Emphasize how your product can solve their problem and why they should act now.
Make it easy for customers to act by displaying the CTA somewhere prominent, like the top of a landing page, the end of a guide post, or in a colorful, clickable button at a strategic point in a YouTube video.
Finally, remember to test your CTAs to identify which strategy resonates most with your audience.
In many ways, great marketing is all about helping people help themselves.
Send them clear, concise, actionable emails emphasizing how they can solve their problems through buying your products or using your services.
Again, ensure there’s an obvious CTA so potential customers know what action you expect them to take.
Did you know that 72 percent of customers won’t make a purchase until they’ve read some reviews? Give those customers the reassurance they need to take the final step by adding some testimonials to your page.
You can either just ask customers for reviews, or you can take a look at your existing reviews on websites like Facebook and LinkedIn and ask for permission to share them in your content.
Where should you display testimonials?
It all depends on your audience, brand goals, and marketing strategy. You could, for example:
Finally, you might offer other incentives like free trials, competitor comparison guides, demo videos, and product samples to nurture leads into becoming paying customers.
Great marketing is not just about finding customers. It’s about retaining them, too. Here’s why.
Sounds great, right? Here are some strategies for retaining those all-important loyal customers.
Next-selling is when you follow up with a customer after a purchase and offer them a similar product with, perhaps, an attractive discount attached. Not only does this allow you to communicate with your customer and make them feel valued, but it’s a way to potentially increase revenue.
Say you want to know whether customers who buy coffee machines are more likely to buy a discounted toaster. You can send the customers who bought a coffee machine a discount code for toasters, and send a control group a full price ad on toasters.
Next-selling can provide you with helpful data to build effective funnels.
Loyalty programs are crucial to any customer retention strategy, with 81 percent of millennials spending more money when they’re a member of a loyalty scheme. However, since loyalty schemes are nothing new, you need to get creative if you plan on building a winning program.
When you’re creating your own program, consider:
Amazon Prime, for example, stands out because customers enjoy benefits like free same-day delivery, exclusive savings, and access to members-only shopping events.
With the Starbucks Rewards program, members pay through the Starbucks app, and they earn points towards perks like free food and drink. What’s really great about this scheme, though, is how it’s centralized through the app, meaning Starbucks can access large volumes of data about user behavior to inform their marketing strategy:
Make your loyalty program work for you by using it to monitor customer preferences and buyer behavior.
When you update your products, you’re keeping up with evolving customer demands and changing expectations. You’re showing your loyal customers that you value their continued loyalty.
For example, maybe you can update an app glitch, based on user feedback. Or, you could launch an add-on to improve a software download.
In short, product updates are a great way to improve the user experience.
How else can you keep those all-important customers? Well, you can try marketing strategies such as:
Finally, don’t forget to capitalize on your existing customers by encouraging them to make more purchases. There are a few strategies you can try, so here’s a rundown of your best options.
With cross-selling, you look at a customer’s most recent purchase and show them similar products they might be interested in. Or, during the sales process, you offer them other items which complement the item they’re currently buying.
For example, say someone buys a laptop from your website. As part of your sales funnel, you might also recommend a charger or laptop case to go along with their purchase.
Here’s a real example from REI Co-op. Say, for example, a lead decides to view a set of strength trainers. Under the product listing, there’s a “people also viewed” list, which highlights similar products the lead might be interested in:
It’s not a pushy strategy, but it nurtures leads in the right direction.
Upselling means offering a customer a more expensive alternative to the item or service they’re interested in.
For example, if someone selects a free subscription to your service, you might highlight the cheapest paid subscription option to them.
Just remember, though, to avoid being too pushy at all times when you’re upselling.
Here’s a good example from Best Buy. The customer views an entry-level MacBook Air. Above the product, they see other more expensive products from the MacBook range, one of which also has an enticing discount attached to it:
The products advertised aren’t massively different in price from the viewed product, and it’s a good, subtle example of upselling.
There are a few other strategies you can try to grow your customer base and build your business, including:
Test out a few strategies and identify which ones resonate best with your customers.
In reality, there’s no such thing as a perfect funnel. However, if your funnel is underperforming, it could be due to common errors such as:
To find out why your funnel isn’t working optimally, you need to run some A/B testing or use an analytics tracking tool like Google Analytics (GA) or Hotjar.
Alternatively, you can perform some lead outreach. Send out surveys or ask for feedback about the website user experience, and always take negative comments on board when you’re refining your funnel. They’ll give you very clear insight on what your audience does or doesn’t want.
Want to experiment with different funnel variations and track their performance? Give Optimizely a try.
It’s easy enough to use. Once you’ve registered, simply head to your “Experiments” dashboard, select “Create New,” and choose whichever experiment you want to run, such as A/B testing or a personalization campaign:
After you create your experiments, you can track them from your dashboard and make whatever changes best suit your marketing strategy. For example, you might refine your CTA or emphasize a new product. You can run multiple variations simultaneously, too, and track which one works best.
Whatever your conversion goal, Optimizely can help you realize it. Sign up for a free version, or choose a paid subscription with more advanced features if your marketing budget can stretch to it.
Google Analytics is another handy tool for funnel tracking. With GA, you can easily track customers from the moment they visit your page to whenever they decide to either abandon their journey or complete the purchase.
Since we’re trying to visualize a funnel, you want to set a “Destination” goal such as registering for a newsletter.
From here, you can identify where people leave your funnel or where they loop back to different stages.
The four stages are “Attention,” “Interest,” “Desire,” and “Action.” You’re trying to attract attention, generate interest, encourage the customer to want the product, and have them take the desired action.
The goal is the objective you’re trying to achieve e.g., a customer completing a sale. The funnel is the journey the prospect takes to reach this goal.
Start by checking out funnel visualization tools like Google Analytics.
A conversion funnel shows you the paths people take on their journey from visiting your website to becoming paying customers.
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Think of your conversion funnel as an evolving process. Just as your customers want and need change over time, so should you adapt your goals and funnel strategy to match.
When you strive to give your customers the user experience they’re hoping for, you won’t just build a loyal client base: you’ll stand out from your competitors, too.
Have you built your first conversion funnel yet?
Experience is kind of the holy grail when it comes to customer interaction, from marketing and sales to customer service and brand loyalty.
It’s something we all talk about, work toward, and set as a goal, but to some degree, it remains a concept we’re always trying to work for.
When do we actually achieve a great customer experience in our brands? Is it something we just have to continually improve and build on as new opportunities roll out?
When a customer has a great experience with you, they are more likely to come back and buy again.
Social media, mobile apps, in-app ads, artificial intelligence, augmented reality, and more have promised to help us put experience at the forefront.
As new options roll out, keeping customer experiences seamless and continuous across all digital platforms grows is highly important. This is where a digital experience platform (or DXP) comes in.
Although the specifics vary by the product or vendor, a digital experience platform is a single digital hub that allows a brand to use data and AI to create and deploy custom content experiences for consumers and integrate them for consumption across an array of digital and other ecosystems.
In simpler terms, it’s a platform that lets you create custom experiences informed by your data and lets users experience them everywhere they look.
Just as important as a definition of what a digital experience platform is what it’s not. A digital experience platform is not just a single experience provider, no matter how revolutionary or innovative. It’s also not just a series of omnichannel brand messages linked together by a series of integrations or pointing to or from a webpage.
A digital experience platform is integrated and inclusive. It’s often an open-source platform that allows API integrations from various departments, such as sales, to deliver super personal experiences to users. Those features define this type of platform and differentiate it from others, which we will discuss later.
When it comes to content creation and management, the acronyms can start to feel like alphabet soup. DXM, CMS, and WEM have similar purposes but approach it from slightly different angles.
Let’s look at the other two types of platforms first.
CMS stands for a content management system. By definition, it’s software that allows you to create, manage, and share your brand’s content. In more everyday terms, it’s a platform that allows you to build your website (and its content, such as pages and blog posts) with a backend interface that doesn’t require writing the code from scratch.
The interface is user-friendly and welcomes you to plug in your content and go. It also makes it easy for you to search through your content for reuse and resharing, create SEO-friendly content, and more.
How is it different from WEM, or web engagement management? We can think of WEM as the next generation of content management. It’s about how we interact on the internet and how customers expect brands to interact with them. Differentiating features of web engagement management include customer engagement through conversations, community building, multichannel reach, and automation.
Where does that leave us with a digital experience platform? It’s essentially a further evolution.
With the rise of AI and big data, we have more and more information for brands to use to deliver content that is more likely to convert. A DXP pulls information in but also delivers across multiple platforms.
If your brand has been around for a while, or if you’re used the internet for e-commerce for any amount of time, you have a website, which means you have experience with a content management system. Whether you’ve dipped your toes into WEM environments or are wondering if a DXP is right for you, let’s talk more about who needs one.
A digital experience platform is about helping you reach people at many touchpoints and controlling the message they receive at those touchpoints.
It’s also about receiving data from your company and letting it drive the message.
How do you know if a digital experience platform is right for you? Here are a few questions to consider:
A digital experience platform may not be a necessary next step for every brand, but if you’re struggling to keep up with a wide range of integrations and just need a place to take everything to the next level, this may be the right way to go.
There are many to consider, but here are a few of the best tools for digital experience.
Bloomreach is a popular digital experience platform for online commerce, which serves 25 percent of the e-commerce experiences in the United States and the United Kingdom. Its Bloomreach Experience Platform or BrX, as it’s called, features a number of modules, including SEO and merchandising.
Liferay provides a digital experience platform that promises to be custom to your business needs, integrating with where you are today and growing with new features as your business grows. In other words, they boast you can get going with this platform quickly.
Core dna emphasizes that, with their platform, all your digital marketing components are finally under one roof. You can keep track of the data in one place and make global adjustments from one location as well, rather than keeping up with various integrations and platforms.
FirstSpirit DXP, from e-Spirit, highlights its ability to integrate with other platforms or tools you may already be using, along with its many features. It also makes sure to note the platform itself does not require deep development or coding knowledge on the user’s end but is approachable and easy to learn.
A digital experience platform is a new concept in a lot of ways, so you may want to do a deeper dive and learn more before you decide whether it’s right for you. There are many resources available to help you get a handle on everything involved and learn how it can help your e-commerce shop. Here are a few to get you started.
If you prefer an audio and visual overview of a digital experience platform, check out the Intro to Digital Experience webinar on YouTube from Progress. This 30-minute video covers all the basics, including what those custom touchpoints for customers look like and why they’re so important.
The webinar also speaks to the customer journey and how to remain consistent throughout. You’ll learn about how a digital experience platform relates to your CMS and how to take it to the next level.
Written by Shailesh Kumar Shivakumar and Sourabhh Sethii and bearing the subtitle of “A Guide to Developing Next-Generation Enterprise Applications,” Building Digital Experience Platforms is for the person who is ready to get serious about a digital experience platform and geek out over the features and options available.
While the book goes into various open-source platforms available for creating a DXP, it also dives into the specifics about best practices and what you will want to consider as you design a digital experience platform. It also explores security issues and case studies.
If you’re ready to really get into the weeds with what a digital experience platform is all about, this Operationalizing a Digital Experience (DXP) Platform webinar from Lytics has all the research and data you’re looking for. This webinar aims to discuss how companies are using customer data to drive custom experiences to convert.
It’s presented by Connie Moore, Senior Vice President of Research for Digital Clarity Group, and it covers topics such as why customer data technology is so important, how to put data at the center of your digital experience strategy, and the reasons why all of these topics are exploding in popularity.
Are you wondering how a digital experience platform would fit in your business, or how it would impact your department and help you interact with other departments across the company? The Rise of the Digital Experience Platform e-book from Elastic Path seeks to help you answer those questions.
Of course, this is one of those email opt-in methods Elastic Path is using to get you on their email list. Nonetheless, it could be a helpful resource as you seek to wrap your head around what a DXP is all about. It promises tips and strategies for Chief Information Officers and Chief Digital Officers looking to incorporate a digital experience platform.
If you’re still skeptical about how exactly digital experience platforms can help you connect meaningfully with your customers, Bloomreach created a webinar entitled “How Digital Experience Platforms Nurture and Facilitate Lasting Customer Relationships” with Mehmet Olmez, managing director for Accenture Interactive, and Arjé Cahn, CTO of Bloomreach Experience.
They talk about how a DXP offers more than just multitouch or omnichannel and is the way of the future by seamlessly integrating those touchpoints and making them hyper-personalized. They also talk about how this supports e-commerce marketing and the benefits of having everything together under one digital hub.
Again, this is an email opt-in, so you can expect to get emails following up, but if you’re curious to learn about DXPs from the makers and marketers of digital experience platforms, this one may be worth your time.
A digital experience platform ties in data and AI learning technology to deliver seamless and multilayered touchpoints that are highly customized and relevant to each individual customer.
A digital experience platform or DXP serves as a single hub for e-commerce marketing, pulling in and learning from data from across the company’s ecosystem, including sales, inventory, and more, and then delivering highly customized experiences to shoppers.
DXP stands for digital experience platform. It’s the next evolution of content management, e-commerce experience solutions, and marketing technology and helps companies stand out as relevant in an increasingly noisy digital world.
As companies utilize digital experience platforms, good digital experiences for customers are pertinent and timely, meeting their needs and delivering content that ultimately leads to conversions.
Customers want experiences with your brand. More importantly, they want really great experiences to keep them coming back for more. This includes everything from searching and coming across your website, to the sales, customer service, and follow-up process.
As you scale, ensuring a great customer experience can become harder and harder, but building a solid e-commerce website can help. A digital experience platform, or DXP, can provide space to create and automate experiences that will keep them returning.
Have you interacted with an engaging digital experience platform recently?
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Remote: Yes, experienced remote worker.
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Steven A. Cohen’s Point72 Asset Management recently reached a settlement with a female employee who sued the firm in 2018 alleging unfair pay practices and a pervasively sexist work environment.
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Email: mariani.mirko@gmail.com
Email me for updated CV.
Work Taxes– What Are They?
If you have staff members, you are in charge of paying a range of tax obligations at the government, state, and also regional degrees. You have to likewise keep specific tax obligations from the incomes of your staff members. What are work tax obligations?
Work tax obligations consist of the complying with.
1. Government revenue tax obligation withholding
2. Social Security as well as Medicare tax obligations
3. Federal joblessness tax obligation (FUTA).
Federal Income Taxes/Social Security and also Medicare Taxes
You usually need to hold back government earnings tax obligation from incomes paid to a worker. Type W-4 is made use of to identify the certain quantity, although the majority of pay-roll solutions or your accounting professional will certainly do this for you.
Social safety as well as Medicare tax obligations pay for advantages that households as well as employees obtain under the Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA). Social safety and security tax obligation pays for advantages for the retired, survivors, and also special needs insurance coverage circulation arrangements of FICA.
Generally, you have to transfer these tax obligations by check or money to a certified banks, usually your financial institution. Get in touch with your tax obligation specialist to ensure you are not called for to make use of the Electronic Federal Tax Deposit System (EFTPS). Despite the settlement approach, you will certainly after that report them on Form 941, the Employer’s Quarterly Federal Tax Return
Federal Unemployment Tax (FUTA).
FUTA is a mixed government and also state program that offers joblessness settlement to the jobless. As a local business owner, you are only in charge of paying this tax obligation, to wit, absolutely nothing is held back from the incomes of your staff members. FUTA is figured out by utilizing Form 940, yet you are motivated to utilize a tax obligation expert to identify settlement quantities.
Work tax obligations can be annoying for a small company proprietor. They are, however, an essential wickedness as your organisation expands.
If you have workers, you are liable for paying a range of tax obligations at the government, state, as well as neighborhood degrees. What are work tax obligations?
Social safety as well as Medicare tax obligations pay for advantages that family members as well as employees get under the Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA). Inspect with your tax obligation expert to make certain you are not called for to make use of the Electronic Federal Tax Deposit System (EFTPS). No matter of the settlement technique, you will certainly after that report them on Form 941, the Employer’s Quarterly Federal Tax Return
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