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Getting The Picture

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“I never read. I just look at pictures.” – Andy Warhol

No one likes the look of a solid block of text – it looks too much like work. Your text might be humorous, informative, or even passionately inspirational, but if no one reads it, it won’t matter. Something that’s worth more than a word – it’s worth a thousand of them if the old adage is right – is a picture. Break up blocks of text on your blog posts and your website with graphics that reflect the ideas or information in your text. The right images actually draw a reader to the text because we assume the text will explain or expand on the image. Let a professional internet marketing company design or help you find the graphics you need.

Images may only be used legally. Wikimedia Commons provides free pictures and graphics that are in the public domain, but they’re generic. Don’t copy anything from Google Image Search; almost every graphic there is copyrighted. An internet marketing company can create the unique designs or shoot the precise photographs you need. Most graphics and photos will have to be tweaked – cropped, enlarged or reduced, and aligned to look good on the page.

Dozens of graphics programs are on the market, but unless photography or graphic design is your passion, all you really need for most purposes comes with Windows 8 – Microsoft Office Picture Manager and Microsoft Paint. If photography and graphics are not your passion, relax. If you lack the time – or the confidence – to handle graphics and the other aspects of internet marketing on your own, don’t hesitate to hire an internet marketing company to help with any or all aspects of your online marketing – including the graphics. Let a good internet marketing company provide the graphics and the other content you need for successful online marketing. Someone could be looking for you on the internet right now, so don’t hesitate to make the call and talk with some internet marketing professionals promptly.

When They Come, Do They Stay?

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If you’re a professional, the first question you might ask an internet marketing company is “How can I increase traffic to my website?” Of course that’s important. But equally important is keeping visitors at your site after they’ve arrived there. Are people leaving your site and going to a competitor? To keep potential clients, you need a site that looks good and navigates easily, and you need content that provides the information and the answers that visitors seek. A professional internet marketing company can help you deal with the reasons people may be leaving your website, which might include:

Unattractive website design: Your website design is a direct reflection of your business. If your design is cheap, ugly, or just outdated, it makes you look second-rate, and most new visitors will keep moving.

Poor content: Text that’s thoughtlessly stuffed full of keywords is aggravating to read. A good internet marketing company can provide writers who smoothly work your keywords into an engaging, informative text.

Pop-ups: Don’t use pop-ups except to offer your visitors a chatbox, and even then, make sure visitors can easily close it. Pop-ups are a genuine nuisance, especially when a visitor is in a hurry to find specific information.

Poor video: If it’s blurry, dark, poorly edited, or if the audio and video aren’t in sync, poor video gives a cheap, unprofessional impression. A good internet marketing firm can produce the high-quality video you really need.

Long download times: If your website takes too long to load, people will leave. It’s that simple.

Finally, in 2015, your website really must be mobile-friendly, and you’ll sink in the search engine rankings if it isn’t. Every factor listed here can cause you to lose potential business, but a professional internet marketing company can tweak your website – or create a fresh one from scratch – and help you keep your visitors where you want them – on your own site. For more about internet marketing and keeping your visitors, consult with some internet marketing professionals – as soon as possible.

Internet Marketing Truths And Fallacies

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Internet marketing presents both unique challenges and unique opportunities. Because internet marketing is still relatively new, plenty of fallacies regarding it are still floating around. Let’s look at several of them:

Fallacy #1: If you have great services or products, you’ll succeed. Not necessarily. Great services or products are imperative, but if you aren’t building relationships and trust, who will know or trust you? Internet marketing lets consumers “get to know you,” trust you, and become comfortable with you. That almost guarantees success.

Fallacy #2: The bottom line is the only important statistic. Of course the bottom line is critical. But the other metrics – your click-through, conversion, and bounce rates – can give you a fuller picture of where you are now and where you’re going. Don’t miss the red flags indicating that your website needs some tweaking.

Fallacy #3: If you build it, they will come. That’s true only in the movies. No one is going to find your website without some effort on your part, and SEO (search engine optimization) is key. Compile a set of keywords that reflect what your services or products are about, and create a site that includes these terms. With proper SEO and engaging, practical content, then they will come. A good internet marketing agency can create your website and its content, ensure proper and sufficient SEO, and help you promote your website through social media and backlinking, pay-per-click advertising, and email marketing.

The most important thing to remember is that online shopping is an experience, whether the consumer is shopping for a home, a microwave oven, or a doctor or lawyer. Establishing a web presence that’s comfortable, trustworthy, informative, and personalized is imperative to internet marketing success. Learn more. Discuss your internet marketing with the experts at a good internet marketing agency, and don’t wait. Someone may be looking for you online right now.

Graphic Design Terms For Internet Marketing

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You want your website to look professional, but you may not be trained in graphic design. It’s not that hard to have a great-looking site; don’t hesitate to hire a webmaster or a social media marketing company to help you. But even if you hire a pro, you’ll still want input into what your site looks like. Learning some basics about graphic design will help. Here are some basic terms and definitions:

Tear sheet or swipe file: A swipe file, also called a tear sheet, is a collection of clippings and images that you like. A website designer can pull examples to create a mood board, a collage of visuals that conveys the look you want for your site. Creating a mood board for yourself can give you a sense of the look and style you want.

Proof: A proof, proof sheet, or paste-up is a copy of what your pages will look like. Website designers might call this a “wireframe” or a “mockup” instead. With a digital wireframe, you might see only a line drawing that outlines where key elements will go but does not show the final actual elements. Don’t fret if the colors, graphics, and words aren’t all in place. Your webmaster or page designer is saving you money by not completing the page until you’ve both approved where everything goes.

Alignment: Centered text is hard to read but is typically used for headlines. You can left- or right-align your text. You can also have justified text, spread evenly to both margins, but a ragged right edge is usually easier to read.

Negative space: Negative space is the blank space around the words and text. Sometimes you’ll also see a “knockout” or “runaround” that doesn’t have an image yet and uses white space as a placeholder.

Copyfitting: Copyfitting is determining how much space an amount of text will take on a page. “Kerning” brings letters closer together. “Leading” is the amount of space between lines of text. Website designers use “lorem ipsum” or other sample text to show you how the final product will appear.

Serif: Serif and “sans” (without) serif fonts convey different feelings. Serif fonts have a line crossing the ending of a stroke. Serif fonts like Times New Roman are time-honored standard fonts that convey seriousness and formality. Sans serif fonts like Calibri and Helvetica do not have the extra line and convey a more dynamic, contemporary feel to your text.

Enhancing Inbound Marketing

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Traditional advertising and marketing are increasingly viewed with suspicion. Millions are wary that “Big Brother” is trying to “brainwash” them. Commercials interrupt their favorite television shows; telemarketers disturb them at dinner. Success in social media marketing, therefore, is now about “developing trust.” Inbound marketing provides perhaps the most effective way to build trust, convert customers, and provide those new customers with something to talk about and share online. Inbound marketing customers come to you as a result of their interests, their online searches, and shares from their friends. With so many people resistant to virtually all forms of marketing, the prospective customer who comes to you is priceless.

How do you enhance your inbound marketing – your ability to bring customers to you? The first key is creating and maintaining interesting social media content that is not advertising and not even necessarily “marketing” in the traditional sense. Attorneys, for example, should answer questions about their field of specialization (What happens if I’m charged with DUI? How do I make a will or apply for a visa?) and offer insights into legal issues in the news.

Real estate agents should highlight not only the homes they sell, but community events, schools, hospitals, community history, and positive local news stories. You get the idea. You gain trust by providing value and practical knowledge at no cost. Prospective clients will see that you do more than sell to your customers; you serve them as well. Since almost everyone is going to need the services of a lawyer or realtor (or a veterinarian, insurance agent, or financial advisor) at some point, they’ll turn to someone they trust. Make that someone you.

The second key is distribution. All of your cleverness and hard work spent creating content does no good if it can’t be found. Of course, the way you distribute content hinges on what you are marketing. Attorneys will put more effort into LinkedIn, but if you create and sell handmade jewelry, you’ll probably put more effort into Pinterest. These are some suggestions for a balanced approach, but you’ll want to tweak these suggestions for your particular audience:

Your blog: One to three posts a week with useful content; 300 to 600 words is ideal.
Social media: Share to Facebook and other sites popular with your audience.
Videos: About two minutes is best; “how-to” demonstrations may be slightly longer.
Email newsletters: Once or twice a month: keep it short.
Ebooks: Make them visually appealing, well-written, and practical.

Some marketers are also achieving success with live webcams, webinars, podcasts, and internet radio stations. Experiment, study your analytics, and find what works best for you. If you don’t feel creative, you don’t have a marketing team, or if you simply don’t have the time, consider working with a social media marketing firm that can create superior content and distribute it effectively. Do whatever it takes to win the trust of the customer who comes to you.

Tell Them A Story

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Yes, we celebrate Martin Luther King Day every year. And still, our society puts up with unfairness and inequality every day. Lawmakers, lawyers, and judges can really do very little to change it. We tolerate misogyny, racism, and prejudice against all kinds of people. Nevertheless, we find ways to be deeply offended by the pettiest slights and the smallest injustices.

When a teacher gives a student a better grade than the student deserves, we can be outraged. If someone on television uses a racial slur, the internet lights up with anger. More than a billion people on this globe live on 23 cents a day or less. Every 16 seconds, somebody in the world dies of hunger – usually a child. But what really gets people mad is what Miley Cyrus or Justin Bieber did on the news last night.

When Sheriff Bull Connor directed fire hoses and vicious dogs on innocent civil rights marchers in Birmingham back in 1963, viewers didn’t see centuries of racism, slavery, and violence. Instead, they saw one small story, one unfair and violent act. It summarized and represented the history of racism in a nutshell – in a brief moment. Two years later, the Civil Rights Act was the law of the land.

People are drawn to small stories and narratives, to something we can grasp, understand, and identify with. When you need multiple charts and graphs and studies from Harvard to get your point across, it’s going to be ignored or at best quickly forgotten.

In social media marketing, you gain one like, one follower, and one new customer at a time. Tell them stories they can relate to. Help them to focus on your message. There’s a reason so many ad campaigns use a theme like “tell us your story.” And there’s a reason so many TV commercials tell stories. Story-telling is one of the oldest – thus one of the surest – ways to communicate. Keep it simple. Keep it focused. Tell them a story.