The Online Marketing Movement; Unlocking the Potential of Digital Marketing was written by Brad Post of Tulsa, OK. He offers an in-depth look at the potential of digital marketing including websites, social media, blogging, podcasts, videos, and paid advertising. Brad is currently the owner of Create the Movement, a digital marketing agency.
The book is intended for small and medium-sized businesses. Brad offers many nuggets of knowledge and wisdom. On page 1, Theodore Levitt is quoted as saying “Creativity thinks up new things. Innovation does new things.” What a start!
My Takeaways:
Align Marketing with Overall Business Goals
There can be multiple pathways to marketing success. Let’s be honest, there can be a lot of money spent on marketing too. Marketing should be viewed in the context of overall business operations and goals.
If a business has the capacity to produce 500 per month of a particular product or service, marketing should not be set to generate sales of 1000 per month. That would just lead to unhappy customers and a lot of stress. The cost of marketing in relation to a company’s profit and cash flow should also be considered.
Website Design
Websites are like the base camp for marketing. Brad offers several tips to balance beauty with functionality. If a website is really cool and pretty, yet is difficult to navigate for the user, business goals may not be met.
Especially for small business owners, it is important to remember that websites should be built to attract and please customers. There might be a difference in what pleases the business owner versus what would be pleasing to a customer.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
Brad offers several tips including website organization, internal & external links, videos, blogging, keywords, title tags, and meta tags.
One subject that really stood out to me was the choice of keywords. For smaller businesses, a focus on “long tail” keywords may be a good choice. There may be lots of competition for keywords that have extremely high search volumes. The bigger companies will probably have these gobbled up.
For example, a long tail keyword might be “organic dog food for beagles” as opposed to just “dog food”. Brad points out that lots of research may need to be performed to come up with the best keywords.
SEO is a hot topic among online marketers. Many think they know exactly how the search engines, like Google, work. I love Brad’s honesty. One of the more frequent questions he receives from clients is “how long does it take SEO to work?” He simply states that he doesn’t know because there are so many variables from website design to actions that the competition may be taking. Not to mention the fact that search engines are constantly changing their algorithms.
It will be interesting to see how generative AI (Artificial Intelligence) may change these algorithms in the future.
The Online Marketing Movement has some wonderful information for small businesses looking to improve their marketing.
Get your copy here.
Note – there are no commissions, I simply think it is a good book!