strategy

Black Friday is when the holiday insanity truly begins. But with that shopping frenzy comes an incredible opportunity for your small business to drum up a lot of holiday sales. In fact, in 2021, people spent a record $886.7 billion on Black Friday, up over 14 percent compared to 2020! To take advantage of one of the biggest shopping holidays of the year, you want to plan your Black Friday email campaign ahead of time, and rather than wait for the day to arrive, you should start sending emails early.  Once your customers know to expect your email on Black Friday, you can use your next email to present a unique offer, and then make sure the best deals go to your best customers. We’ll show you how. Read on for our tips to make this your most successful Black Friday email campaign yet, along with templates and real-life examples

To start your business off on the right foot, be SMART about your goals. My marketing agency was doomed from the start. At least that’s what I thought in 2010. I had no clear direction or confidence, and I nearly gave up on my dreams of owning a small business.  That was until my wife, Linda, taught me how to use SMART goals.  I remember sitting at my desk in the living room of our one-bedroom apartment, head in my hands, as I tried to figure out how I was going to make this work. I got a tap on the shoulder and turned to see Linda with what looked like an arts and crafts project. “Here!” she said as she thrust the items into my hands, “I want you to hang this chalkboard up on the wall and write down how many clients and how much you want to

The holiday season is a crucial time for fundraising because 31% of annual giving happens in December, but it’s also a time when your audience is most overwhelmed by sales and nonprofit messaging. And while everyone else is planning their holiday meals and gift-buying strategies, you’re looking at your accounts and wondering if you’re going to have enough money and resources to keep the doors open next year. To make sure you have enough, you need to find a way to connect with potential donors quickly and inspire them to make their donations now — instead of waiting until the end of the year. You can do that by leveraging Thanksgiving and Giving Tuesday. Thanksgiving is the perfect time for gratitude messaging — people are in a giving mind-frame, and you can incorporate the Giving Tuesday program into your campaign.  Elements of a great Thanksgiving appeals message To craft an

Back in the day, people would simply visit a local shopping mall to browse storefronts in person, looking for the best deals available while they last. But in today’s age of mobile technology, social media, and online shopping, digital marketing has rapidly become the primary mode of engagement to spread the word about seasonal offerings. This means that in order for emerging brands to remain competitive during the hectic holidays, it’s critical to develop a digital marketing strategy that stands apart from other brands. Using these digital marketing tips for the holidays can help you compete in the online market this year. Tips for keeping your small business marketing organized during the holiday season With so much going on over the holidays, creating an effective marketing campaign is sometimes easier said than done. Luckily, it’s fairly easy to put your digital marketing efforts into perspective by following a few simple

The email marketing stats are in, and they all say the same thing: email marketing is well worth your time and energy. In fact, the average email has a return on investment of thirty-six dollars for every dollar spent. But not just any email is going to get you the results you need. Using professionally-designed email templates can help you create the perfect email template that gives you the power to bolster open and click-through rates while defining your brand.  What is an email template?  An email template is an editable template you can use to create a professional-looking email with ease. The perfect email template is styled to match your brand’s tone and vision. It might feature your colors or logo or have a specific language unique to your brand.  The goal of an email template is to expedite the emailing process. Without a template, every time you wanted to send out an

Do you want to optimize your online business and create more revenue? One area where businesses lose sales opportunities is right on their checkout page. A product checkout page is where you need to optimize to provide the best user experience for your online buyers.  There are several marketing best practices that you should apply on your checkout page to minimize friction and increase sales.  If this sounds hard to do, don’t worry. You can make some simple but impactful changes to your checkout page that make it seamless for customers to complete their checkout process.  Let’s look at strategies to boost conversions on checkout pages and skyrocket your sales. Offer free shipping One of the best ways to boost checkout completion is to make your user feel like they’re getting a compelling offer. People like to get value for their money, and this is something you can convey when

In-person and digital events are a great way to introduce your brand to customers and build a loyal fan base. To make them successful, you need to carefully plan and market each event, attracting the right audience and providing them with a memorable experience. However, it’s important to remember that your job’s not over just because the event is.   Once you’ve finished folding the last chair, sweeping the floor, and closing the doors on your venue, it’s time to get to work on your post-event marketing. What is post-event promotion?  Despite what many people think, post-event marketing and engagement go beyond simply saying thank you. It’s a chance to add value to the people in attendance and gather valuable feedback so that your next event can be even better. Post-event promotion starts with following up with those who attended your event. It could be as simple as a thank-you

You can’t knock the power of small business storytelling. From generation to generation, storytelling is the primary way of passing down traditions, beliefs, and important family history. Stories can energize us, empower us, and unite us around a shared cause. If stories are so powerful, then it only makes sense for you to unlock the power of small business storytelling in your marketing.  How To Unlock the Power of Small Business Storytelling In our upcoming Constant Contact webinar – 5 Tips to Level Up Your Email Marketing Efforts – we will be exploring different tactics small business owners like you can use to get more out of each email send. Register Now One of those tactics focuses on the words you use in your email campaigns to drive action. It’s pretty common for business owners to get stuck with writer’s block – unable to type a single word because they

Driving sales in B2B companies is a high-effort and high-reward activity.  And lead generation plays the most crucial role in enabling sales. Without qualified leads, your sales team will waste time trying to attract a wider audience that has no real interest in your products and services.  You need to identify real leads that actually need what you have to offer and have the ability to buy it too. However, finding such leads is easier said than done. And we’ll explore why in more detail next. If you want to kickstart your B2B lead generation, then this post is for you. Here are powerful ideas that will help you attract leads with real potential. The challenges of B2B lead generation Before we can look at practical steps to capture qualified leads, we need to understand what makes the B2B sales process so much more challenging than B2C sales.  Here’s a

You want to provide your customers with top-notch service, test the waters for a new product launch, or get an idea of how you can improve your products.  And you’ve decided to conduct a survey because you know the results will help you move your business forward. But do you know how to interpret the survey results? Start by using an online survey tool that will provide you with the data you need to make better business decisions and build stronger relationships with your customers.  Understand your data to make better business decisions Surveys can help you get honest feedback from your customers. And while interpreting survey results can seem like a hassle, you don’t need to spend months reading surveys and entering them into a database nor do you need to pay someone to do statistical analysis for you. With a little knowledge and planning, you can analyze the