Marketing Advice That Matters
Video marketing is going to outrank all types of marketing communication in the coming days. According to Wyzowl statistics, 79% of consumers prefer watching a video to learn about a product instead of reading texts. And 84% of consumers purchase product after watching a brand’s video. Many businesses have started realizing the importance of video marketing services as well. This is why 63% of businesses have already started using videos as their primary marketing tool. And out of those, 82% of businesses find the video as an important integral part of their marketing initiatives.
This is the right time to go for video marketing before the market gets saturated. Not just because every other business trying to join the bandwagon but because this is the most profitable and versatile online marketing tool available today.
If you are still not convinced or want to find out more about the importance of video marketing, then the following five reasons will help you make a decision. Take a look.
#1 Gives a Good Return-on-Investment
ROI is the key success factor for every business. You might have the financial capability to invest money on a marketing initiative but if it doesn’t generate a good return-on-investment, your business will have a miserable future.
The good news is that 83% of businesses acknowledged that video marketing offers good ROI. Even though you might find video production is challenging and not an economic marketing tool but it pays off big time. Most importantly, with the sheer rise of advanced online video editing tools, video production and marketing is becoming more sophisticated and cost-effective. You can even use your smartphone to produce decent videos.
#2 Boosts Conversions
We did a market research on video marketing service recently and found that many businesses still wary of going for video because they think it’s not a money-making tool. That’s not true at all! Here are some stats that prove why video is the best money-making marketing tool you can ever have.
● According to a report by Unbounce, by including a video on your landing page, you can increase conversions by 80%.
● As per a report by ReelSEO, by incorporating a video on your website’s home page, you can boost conversions by 20% or even more.
● According to Wyzowl, 72% of businesses acknowledged that having a video marketing strategy has improved the conversion rate of their website.
● 64% of businesses believe that videos have directly increased their sales.
#3 Helps You Get Love from Google
Google has a simple rule for ranking websites or videos. If you provide good content to users, Google will make sure your content reaches the maximum by putting your brand to the top of search engine result pages (SERP). And this is where video marketing service can help.
Videos help you increase the time spent by visitors on your website. This gives a signal to Google algorithms that your site has good content and able to connect with your audience for a longer period. The search giant will then push your site to the top of the SERP.
According to a report, your website will be 53x more likely to show up on the first page of SERP if you embed a video on your website.
Also, remember the biggest video platform YouTube is owned by Google. So optimizing your videos for YouTube will also improve your brand visibility both on Google and YouTube.
#4 Helps You Explain Difficult Concepts Easily
One of the biggest advantages of video marketing is that you can explain any type of concepts or messages easily. A video comes with many different formats such as explainer and animated videos. Just choose the one that works best for your business or product and you will be good.
For example, to explain a complex concept, you can produce animated videos as it’s a perfect mixture of simplicity, emotion, and nostalgia.
Similarly, if you have a newly launched product, you can create explainer video to help potential customers learn the benefits of your product. Reports suggest, 98% of users watch explainer videos to learn more about a product.
So do you think you can ignore video marketing service to communicate your message? Do you’ve any questions? Please feel free to leave your comments below.
When you are interviewing for a marketing position, it is best if you prepare in advance for the variety of questions you are likely to encounter. The most commonly asked questions deal with your knowledge about the marketing industry in general and in specific about the company you hope to work with. Prospective employers will want to know how much you have bothered to research their products and services.
Even if you are seeking an entry-level job, you should do your research. It is far better to be over-informed than clueless. Since you want to work with them and immerse yourself in the marketing of their products and services, you had better find out everything you can about their business.
It is generally easy to find information online, so find it and take notes. Don’t take interviews lightly. People are offering you their valuable time when they interview you, so always try to do better on your end. If you don’t get the job, it shouldn’t be on account of a lack of preparation on your part.
Here are three essential interview questions for a marketing position:
1. Why are you interested in this specific marketing job?
Generally, interviewers don’t want to hear the answer that mountaineers give for climbing a mountain – because it is there. No, they don’t want you to tell them that you applied because the job was on the job board and your dire financial straits compelled you to apply. Even if that is the case, the interview isn’t the place for such unvarnished honesty. They have limited time and they only want answers related to their interview questions for marketing position. They want to hear professional-sounding and convincing reasons for your interest in the job.
For instance, you applied because your skills match the ones they require, and you think you have what it takes to handle the position. If you give this answer, explain it with verifiable examples of any similar work you undertook, and try not to sound like a corporate robot. Don’t tell them you are passionate about marketing. That is what they probably hear from everyone, and if they hire you, it will be for your originality, not your clichés.
2. If we hire you, what can we expect from you in the first few weeks?
Interviewers ask this question to discover how much you have researched the position you are applying for and the company you want to work with. If you have done your research, you will know the type of work that you must do in that position, and you will also have an idea about how that applies to marketing the company’s products and services. Having a basic idea of your job responsibilities is very important. It tells the interviewer that you know how to prepare in advance and that you are earnest about wanting to work with them.
Give them a gist of what you know and then take the opportunity to ask for more information about the work and the company. Normally, they ought to be glad to tell you since you have shown yourself to be sincerely interested.
3. What different marketing concepts do you think we should use for our products and services?
This is another question to gauge your awareness of what exactly the company does and how it markets its products and services. Take the time to read the content on the company’s website. Do they talk about their current marketing efforts on their blog? How do they use their social media? How many marketing platforms do they use? What kind of marketing campaign have they run in the past or are currently running? What appears to be their target audience? What kind of public response are they getting? How do they interact with their clients or customers?
Look at their competitors, see what they are doing in their marketing, and make comparisons. Think about what you would do differently if you were handling the company’s marketing efforts. Why would that be necessarily better than what they are doing at present? You need to be able to explain this succinctly. Try to explain in a helpful tone, not in a critical tone. They are hiring marketing professionals to assist them in doing better, not for listing their mistakes and giving them the superior treatment.
Keep in mind that you are marketing yourself every time you go for an interview. Pull that off well, and the rest will be a breeze.
For those who are doing business in China or planning to expand their existing business in China, Baidu advertising is the basis for marketing. Since Google has its minimal presence in China, Baidu does all the work for businesses when it comes to internet marketing because of its hold on more than 70% of the total market. Chinese digital marketing depends a lot on Baidu, and it is closely monitored by the government. This means the companies from outside China, need to go through a lot of legal work and Baidu make sure that things happen smoothly for them. It is the most developed online platform in China for marketing and has the essential security policies and measures properly working to protect the information and the privacy of both the business and the user. Baidu uses the concept of PPC (pay per click) just like Google uses the AdWords, though there are various differences in the way they both operate.
Originally Baidu was not an individual portal; instead, it provided search services to other portals. It then wanted to improve the search experience for Chinese users which meant more investment on the technology which those portals were unable to pay. Robin Li, the founder of Baidu, then launched it as an independent site and continued to develop it as a platform for not only internet search but also for digital marketing in China. Later it introduced various other services such as Baidu maps, Baidu cloud, Baidu knows in addition to its search platform. Baidu was opened to the public on August 5th, 2005 with a small number of shares at really low cost, and was initially funded by Silicon Valley, but it eventually grew to around 350% in just five years. Ever since, it has been expanding itself from internet surfing to digital marketing and has reached the mobile users as well. While Baidu stands number one in China, it is also the fifth most popular search engine in the world. Therefore, Baidu advertising does not only serve the business in China but may also help in the rest of the world as well. Baidu means ‘countless times’ in Chinese, and it got this name after Robin Li got inspired by an 800-year-old Chinese poem where the last line of the poem describes that the poet searched for his beloved thousand times in the crowd. He wanted the name that is related to the word ‘search’ and should be from mandarin so that Chinese people could understand and relate well to it.
The Chinese marketing research agencies have found out that a business is not considered renowned or big enough if it is not present on Baidu. Therefore, if a business does not show up on Baidu, people tend to purchase fewer products even from its stores. Despite of the cultural difference and the language challenges, a business cannot deny the fact that China also provides a huge market for the business and thus many western brands are working on how to use Baidu advertising for maximum profits. Another important thing that businesses need to keep in mind is that Chinese people search in Mandarin instead of English and thus having a website in the Chinese language could be an added advantage to make the most of the Chinese market by making ranking good on the SERP. Baidu provides an index called Zhishu that helps in approaching the online marketing for it provides an insight into the volume of search done using the particular keyword. Then there is keyword planner that shows the volume of search for a particular keyword in a particular time period. Similarly, the Baidu analytics is a web statistic tracking system that allows the business to monitor that how many people are visiting the website and what is directing them to their website and when is the maximum turnover of the users. This works in a similar way as the Google analytics work and help the business in deciding the strategies to target their potential customers.
Most of the world has Google, but China has Baidu. Google is almost absent in one of the largest countries in the world. And when most Chinese netizens prefer Baidu, the largest search engine in China, then why not businesses will advertise on Baidu.
When you are planning to advertise in China, Baidu SEM is your go-to way for advertising your business online. Baidu search engine marketing (SEM) has a lot of similarities with Google search engine marketing, but never think it is the same. It is quite different. Baidu is not a replica of Google. It has its own function, features, and algorithms which are very different from Google.
For advertising online in mainland China, there is a lot of reason to use Baidu. Let’s have a look at the top five reasons.
Major Market Share
Baidu now accounts for the 66.29% of the search engine market share. In the first quarter of 2018, Baidu market share was 80%. So, unquestionably, Baidu is the king of search engine market. It boasts 5 billion searches per day. Definitely, no company would want to miss the opportunity of advertising on such a platform.
Chinese netizens prefer Baidu over other search engines. Google market share in the Chinese market is just meager 2.7%. So there is no point of looking at Google for advertising in China. Even other Chinese search engines such as 360, Sogou, and Shenma are doing far better than Google, but still, Baidu is the undisputed king of the Chinese search engine market.
Chinese Prefer Baidu
Baidu has 657 million monthly active mobile users. Mobile revenue accounted for the 77% of the total revenue of Baidu. Hence, it clearly shows if you want to reach the mobile audience in China, you have to invest in Baidu SEM.
When it comes to searching for something online, Chinese prefer Baidu over others. You can also say- Baidu is truly Chinese. With the deep understanding of how Chinese behave, Baidu has set its algorithm and shows the most relevant results for queries.
Positive Response to Paid Advertisements
When it comes to search engine marketing, we all know the value of organic traffic. But in the Chinese landscape, paid advertising are also performing well. For western companies, some experts even advise only to invest in Baidu PPC ads for Baidu SEM because Baidu paid advertising shows great results. Baidu SERP shows five paid results and ten organic results. So, you have a great opportunity to target your brand in front of the right audience.
Baidu Popularity
Baidu Knows, Baidu Tieba, Baidu Baike, Baidu Wenku, and Baidu Maps are few products launched by the Baidu that has gained a lot of popularity in China. There is a huge audience for each platform. Hence, it simply depicts that Chinese trusts Baidu.
Baidu Baike is a web-based encyclopedia that covers almost every topic. Baidu Baike articles are perceived as the credible source of information. Baidu Knows is the question-answer platform where you can put any query, and find an answer to it. So, there is nothing like Baidu in the Chinese market.
Baidu Marketing Tools
You will never miss Google AdWords or Google Analytics when you invest in Baidu SEM. Baidu has some great marketing tools. Baidu Phoenix Nest is Baidu’s PPC platform. It provides you all the features of Google AdWords. And also, you do not have to worry about Google Analytics, Baidu has Baidu Tongji. These marketing tools are just phenomenal. These tools allow you to plan and run your online advertising campaign. You can easily track your results, take control over your advertising efforts, and implement your Baidu SEM strategy effectively with these tools.
These are the five reasons why you should use Baidu for SEM.
The Bottom Line
SEO and PPC advertising are the two pillars of the search engine marketing. Investing in these marketing strategies can earn you millions of customers for your business. And the majority of the Chinese netizens trust and prefer Baidu. Therefore, investing in Baidu SEM seems to be the best way to advertising your business online in China.
An extremely large volume of searches in China happens through the search engine Baidu, making it one of the country’s biggest. However, the audience in China behaves differently from those in the other parts of the world, making search engine marketing and advertising on Baidu different from that performed elsewhere. Online marketing in China needs a different recipe altogether, and for marketers, brands, and e-commerce players looking to grow brand awareness tap into a new set of customers, or to improve sales through Baidu advertising, here are a few things to know.
# 1 – The audience network is extremely huge
China has the world’s largest population. The country also has one of the largest online population, which gives marketers a compelling reason to advertise their products and services through Baidu. However, the large number of online users also means that your advertising efforts may not meet its target if not monitored or fine-tuned correctly. Therefore, it becomes important to know who in this large pool of audience you want to attract. This avoids dilution of efforts by money being wasted on attracting the wrong set of people towards what you want to sell. It is also good to have realistic budgets in place for all your advertising efforts done through Baidu as capturing potential customers from this large pool can soon exhaust budgets if not monitored carefully.
# 2 – There is a lot of paperwork to be done
The Baidu search engine and its associated marketing and advertising activities are monitored heavily by the Chinese governments. Advertising on Baidu may not be as easy and effortless as creating a campaign account on other search engines. So, as a Western brand or company looking to gather traction in China, you need to be prepared to go through a lot of bureaucracy, paperwork and contract before you can have your Baidu ads up and running. For instance, to open the account, you need a company registration and finance documents to be submitted. If your product or service lies in a highly restricted industry like an airline, finance, or healthcare sectors, you may also need additional documents to get the process done. While this may not be seen in the Western world, such procedures are fairly common when conducting search engine marketing or advertising in China. As someone new to Chinese waters, you may find these processes tiring, but with the help of a marketing or ad agency, you can get your paperwork in place in a breeze.
# 3 – Chinese landing pages can make a world of difference
People are searching for a product or service through Baidu usually do so in Chinese. While these searches can be redirected to a webpage in English, the efficacy of your efforts can be better when the search gets redirected to a landing page in Chinese, as the latter performs better. From the user’s perspective, a person conducting a search in Chinese, when presented an English result page, may not stay for long to discover what you have to offer. This can increase bounce rates, causing you to lose potential leads just because you did not cater to their language needs. It can also result in your Baidu marketing efforts being pushed down the drain.
# 4 – Socio-cultural differences need to be addressed
Chinese audience are different from those in the Western world. The socio-cultural differences are evident in how users perceive products and services and respond to marketing and advertising campaigns on a search engine like Baidu. So, when testing the waters in the Chines landscape, be prepared for some surprises. What works for online advertising campaigns elsewhere may not give you many results in the country. So, before you begin your advertising efforts on Baidu, it is good to speak to experts who have experience advertising in this market. Also, trend and consumer needs and preferences are constantly changing, so getting some expert help can be of immense value especially if you are a novice to marketing in China.
Baidu advertising may be tricky when compared to online marketing efforts elsewhere, but with the right approach and efforts, you can meet your targets and see results, with ease.
Marketing is a profession that is difficult to pin down with precise definition. Its scope is too fluid and extensive, and this makes things somewhat problematic when it comes to assessing potential marketing candidates. If you were interviewing someone for a mechanical engineering position, for instance, their engineering skill sets would generally suffice to demonstrate their ability to get the job done. You must take a different approach when it comes to hiring a marketing candidate.
In addition to understanding how marketing works and having enough knowledge of various marketing strategies, the candidate has to have the right kind of attitude to thrive in this industry. A career in marketing, for the most part, is not for the fainthearted. You must have the ability to deal with setbacks, to bounce back from rejections, and to still find the energy to forge ahead and convince people of the feasibility of your marketing strategy.
The following three marketing interview questions can help marketing recruiters identify if a prospective candidate has what it takes to do well in this field.
Why Are You Seeking a Career in Marketing?
It seems like a standard question, but it is a significant one. With this question, the interviewer wants to understand the candidate’s primary motivation for taking this career path and to check if they are here for the long haul. It would be to the company’s disadvantage, after all, if they were to hire someone with no passion for and no serious interest in marketing.
The interviewer also wants to know if the candidate has realistic expectations about a marketing career and if they are aware of the day to day responsibilities they would have to undertake. Also, the question seeks to discover if the candidate is capable of self-reflection and self-assessment, has ambition and intelligence, is articulate, and can get along with diverse people.
What is Your Idea of a Successful Marketing Campaign and Why?
Here is the candidate’s chance to demonstrate their understanding of marketing campaigns, their knowledge of past and/or current marketing campaigns in the real world, their familiarity with different marketing methods such as optimization techniques, A/B testing, lead generation, inbound and outbound marketing, using marketing analytics tools, and their ability to explain what makes a marketing campaign a success. The interviewer wants to understand how the candidate thinks, if they are logical and capable of looking at the bigger picture or if they have the tendency to get bogged down by details.
It is also important to know if the candidate considers the end consumer and cares about customer satisfaction, not just company profit. It is a positive sign if the candidate can show how well they keep up with industry trends and how they take those into account in drawing up their marketing plan.
How Would You Deal with Setbacks and Difficult Clients?
Presenting the candidate with a hypothetical problematic situation and asking them how they would resolve it or asking them to give an example of a real-life difficulty that they dealt with to their satisfaction can give the interviewer an idea about the candidate’s ability to remain calm and rational when things are not going well for them.
Stress and dissatisfied customers are common and regular occurrences in the marketing field, so it is essential that a potential marketing candidate doesn’t fall apart at the first whiff of trouble. It is several points in the candidate’s favor, of course, if they instead display the ability to overcome a charged situation with constructive solutions that can retain and even improve the company’s standing with consumers.
Asking these three questions and noting the answers can help interviewers sift through applicants and select candidates with an aptitude for marketing. There is, of course, no one right answer to any of the questions. The answers will vary according to the personality of the candidate, their background and experience, and the role they are applying for.
What interviewers generally look for, more than just ability and passion for marketing is someone with a broad outlook, who is quick thinking and easy to get along with and will fit in well with the overall company culture.
SEO is not as easy as it seems. In the last few years, SEO has gone through several revolutions. SEO is divided into several elements and it not easy for businesses to offer every SEO service. An easy solution to the problem is hiring white label SEO services that offer complete SEO package.
With so many white label service providers competing, selecting the right one can be a daunting task. To make things easy for you, we have compiled a list of tips that would help you hire the best white label SEO Company.
Determine Your Priorities
Before selecting any white label service provider, you need to determine the SEO needs of your clientele. Some questions you need to ask yourself are:
· What are the features needed by your clients?
· How easy is it to reach their customer support and get answers?
You need to review carefully the service offerings of the SEO agency. Some common SEO services you need to look for are website audits, link building, keyword ranking tracking, white label reporting, and more.
Review Portfolio
Do not forget to ask for and review the portfolio of the white label SEO service provider. The portfolio of the SEO agency would show every facet of the inbound marketing, search engine optimization expertise, and the craft of the SEO specialists in every engagement.
Every digital agency is more likely to have a customized strategy for different SEO activities. Only a good SEO agency would offer customized strategies for both, SEO activities and clients. The portfolio of the SEO agency should cover technical SEO, link building, content strategy, digital strategy and measurement planning, and reputation management to name a few.
Check SEO Agency’s Experience and Track Record
Whether you are approaching a small or big SEO agency, you need to look for experience and track record of the agency. It is easy for anyone to set up an SEO agency and tell clients they are an SEO expert. The truth is it takes many years of SEO experience to know what truly works.
Any SEO agency can pay for Google AdWords and get their client’s ads on the first pages of the search engine results page. You need to look for an SEO agency who has managed to bring their client’s website on first search engine results page organically.
Check Pricing
Budgeting is an important factor when working with a white label SEO services provider. There is no such thing as buying at wholesale prices and double the price and sell them at retail. In fact, there is no perfect formula for solutions pricing and there are several factors to consider.
You need to analyze your competitors in your market and find out their pricing structure.
You need to understand how your competitors are pricing their solutions and what is included in the SEO packages.
Based on your pricing research and competitive analysis, you need to negotiate solutions pricing with the white label service provider which would work for you and also meet your client expectations.
Check the Technology Expertise
Search engine optimization keeps changing. In the initial years, SEO activities were centered on desktop users but the marketing landscape has changed drastically. Today, the SEO agency needs to pay attention to the ever-growing mobile users and the way they access online content.
The SEO agency should have a clear technology standpoint for different SEO activities. But how do you know about the technology used by the SEO firm? The answer is by asking the right questions to the SEO agency like:
· Do you use tools like Moz?
· Do you use standard APIs for keyword research or backlink analysis?
Not only the agency should be able to develop strong marketing campaigns but also should be capable of using the right tools to measure progress and results of the SEO activities.
These useful tips would help you get a right SEO partner on board which allows you to focus on core business competencies while the white label SEO services provider meets the client’s need for different SEO services.
Do you know any other tips that would help select right white label SEO Company? Please feel free to comment.
