Is my business ready for SEO?
[bctt tweet=”Without SEO, your business is basically invisible. You need to be visible!” username=”SheLeadsAfrica”] Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of refining your website using both on and off-page optimization techniques so that it will be indexed and ranked by search engines, naturally. – Digital Marketing Institute If you have had a hard time understanding SEO (Search Engine Optimization), let’s start with a visual exercise. Picture this -you have a wonderful store with all the best offerings, only…your store is invisible. Not just that; millions of your potential consumers pass by daily looking for just what you offer. Crazy right? Yes, that’s exactly what your business is without SEO. You need to be visible! Take results from a Wild Fusion Digital Center 2016 channel effectiveness study, for instance; 63% of Nigerian consumers use search engines to research and buy products. This puts Search right at the center of the purchase funnel. You need to ensure your business shows up when people search for the services you offer. How SEO Works Ever wondered how search results show up? Let’s talk spiders! Google has an inventory or index where it stores keywords and information regarding the websites they originate from. This index is populated by search engine spiders who crawl the web. When they get to your site, they populate the index with keywords from your site. As people search online they are actually querying the index. What Google then does is to present the most relevant results of the search from its inventory. So basically, if Google doesn’t have you in their index, there’s no way you are showing up in the search results. This is why you need to optimize your website for search engines. Ranking on the search engine … Page 1, Page 2..Page 10 Ranking is website positioning in SERP (Search Engine Results Pages). Your ultimate goal would be to rank on page 1 and even better, be the first result. Like the saying goes ‘the best place to hide a dead body is on page 2 of Google search engine’. As crazy as that sounds, the reality is that search engine visibility is a clear indicator of good marketing, it also lends credibility to your brand. [bctt tweet=”Search engine visibility is a clear indicator of good marketing & lends credibility to your brand” username=”SheLeadsAfrica”] SEO is a continuous effort. Every day, businesses similar to yours are competing for the same keywords, trying to convince Google that they are more relevant. Google considers a number of factors when ranking websites, but today we will highlight two. Content Relevance You want to ensure that your content is relevant. Start your content strategy with keyword research. This helps you figure out real questions and ideas that matter to your consumers. The Google Keyword Planner will come in handy here. Also, your content should be readable, you should avoid duplicating content at any cost. Mobile Responsiveness Nothing is more frustrating than getting to a site via your mobile phone and finding it’s so difficult to navigate. Think user experience when designing your site! – This article was written by Uche Offokaja. Uche is the Client Solutions Manager Wild Fusion, Africa’s leading Digital Marketing Agency.
A stitch in time: The importance of timing in managing business cash flow
[bctt tweet=”#MotherlandMoguls be aware that poor cash flow management could ruin your business” username=”SheLeadsAfrica”] A stitch in time saves nine…whoever said that was right. The saying is a warning against procrastination. Putting off doing important stuff until it is more convenient is never a great strategy in personal life and especially in business. When it comes to your business, it needs to have a minimum amount of cash to remain afloat. Maintaining liquidity requires intentional effort and coordination to ensure that you meet this requirement. Poor cash flow management has been known to floor businesses. At the root of the famous Enron scandal was the management of cash flow. That is why #MotherlandMoguls who are their own #Bosses need to pay attention to it. Managing your business cash flow There are three major warning signs you need to pay attention to when managing your cash; Slow Collection: When your sales are not moving as fast as you expected them to or you are not making sales at all. Excessive short-term debt: “Short term” usually refers to debt that is due in 90 days or less. The larger this figure is, the higher the chances that your business is cash strapped. Overtrading: Making sales is a good thing; the problem is having more credit sales which means that the cash your business should have is stuck with your customers. Sometimes what happens is that businesses ignore some warning signs and fail to respond to them on time which leads to bigger problems. One of the most important things to do here is to monitor and coordinate when money comes in and when it goes out. The moment you recognise a situation that is likely to put your business at cash flow risk, deal with it at the earliest opportunity. This is one of the lessons that Julia learned. [bctt tweet=”Timing is everything when it comes to managing cash in a business” username=”SheLeadsAfrica”] A business at standstill We met Julia in one of our Financial Education workshops. Julia runs a small milk delivery business and she was having a few challenges with her cash flow. A majority of her customers bought her milk on credit which she let them have for a period that was not specified. When we met her, her main problem was that she was not able to pay her milk suppliers because she didn’t have enough cash on her. Some of her customers owed her for more than two months and the fact that she could not pay for the milk meant that her business was at a standstill. Julia also rents a storage unit where she stocks up her milk; she was in arrears for one month and was about to throw in the towel when we met her. Lessons from Julia Timing is everything when it comes to managing cash in a business, you must be sure about the dates when major payments (out and into the business) are expected and when. Some of the tips we gave Julia for her business were: First to consider taking a loan as she tries to stabilise her cash position Not to rely on her sales to make basic payments such as rent and wages since Julia might not always meet her sales targets. Rather she should have savings that she can dip in when the going gets tough. This savings can be built slowly over time when business is good. Not to order excess milk if she doesn’t think she can sell it. To compare the credit terms of different suppliers and pick the one that works best to her advantage. [bctt tweet=”One way to ensure money moves through your business is by saving up to make basic payments ” username=”SheLeadsAfrica”] A couple of months later, Julia who had decided to continue her business reported that her business was doing much better as she had found another supplier who had better credit terms. She also instituted stricter credit terms with her customers. If your business is cash-strapped consider taking on some of the tips we have given and you just might end up with a smile on your face like Julia did.
Social Media Marketing- What? Why? How?
[bctt tweet=”Social media marketing has gone been perceived as a fad to a must-have for brands today” username=”SheLeadsAfrica”] Let’s start with 2 definitions to answer the What: social media noun websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking Source: Oxford Dictionary social media marketing noun the process of gaining traffic or attention through social media sites Source: Searchengineland Simple right? Now that we’ve cleared that up, let’s dive right into the Why! Social media marketing has gone from what was perceived as a fad in the early 2000s to a must-have for brands today. Every brand, business, and entity wants to have a presence on every social media platform. Why should YOU think about social media marketing? Well, it starts with you as a brand. Social media is an opportunity for you to build your personal brand, and grow your authority on your subject. Your social media profiles are the first thing to show up in a Google search for your name. These are the best places to start with establishing you as a brand. Twitter is a great place to weigh in with your opinions. LinkedIn is the best place to detail your professional experience and showcase your expertise. Facebook allows you to keep in touch, and share your views. Instagram provides a place to chronicle your life’s journey. When it comes to your business, social media lets you reach a staggering number of people at a fraction of the cost of traditional media. Take Facebook, for example. There are more than 15 million Nigerians on Facebook. For $10/day, you can reach up to 40,000 people. That’s a staggering amount of people and dirt cheap when you compare it to the cost to reach those people through traditional media channels. The best part is you don’t always have to pay to reach them. It’s all about how you communicate with them. The variety of social media channels means you can showcase your business and its personality in different ways. Social media allows you to get in front of your consumer where they are. And believe me, they are everywhere! Social media is becoming an integral part of the marketing funnel. With the advent of messenger bots, live video, and VR, it is now possible to sell a product and an experience without any physical process. That is huge in itself and signals a drastic shift in how consumers’ purchasing activity. [bctt tweet=”Social media is becoming an integral part of the marketing funnel” username=”SheLeadsAfrica”] So how do you start? For starters, do not go and create an account on every social media platform for your business. Yes, that’s right, do NOT. It starts with listening. You understand your business and your target audience. The next thing is to see where your target audience is and what they’re saying. When you’re armed with that knowledge, you can then think about which platforms your business needs and how your business is going to join in the conversation on them. Remember each platform has its own nuances, and it’s best to understand them before jumping on them. Take the time to study each platform. Some tips for your content: Keep it relevant and informative. Statistics show that consumers engage most with relevant and engaging content. Use an 80:20 approach. 20% of your content should be sales focused. The 80% should educate, showcase, inform and entertain your consumers. Always be ready to adapt. What works today might not work tomorrow, and the landscape is always changing. Be ready to change with it. Be conversational. Integrate. Your social media sales communication should not be in isolation of any other marketing activity you’re running. Social media marketing is not a thing of tomorrow, it is a thing of now. And every passing day, it’s evolving. All aboard? – This article was written by Prashant Kirpalani. Prashant is the Social Media Manager at Wild Fusion, Wild Fusion is Africa’s leading Digital Marketing Agency. When he’s not working, he likes to game, DJ, and tweet about Chelsea and fantasy football.
Case study: How your business can stand out from the competition
[bctt tweet=”Competition is a “necessary evil” of doing business, here’s how to make yours stand out” username=”SheLeadsAfrica”] If you’re in business, competition is something you can’t do without. In other words, competition is a “necessary evil” of doing business. It does not, however, mean that competition in your business area is a bad thing. On the contrary, when there are several competitors in your niche, it shows that you’re on the right track and that there’s money to be made there. What you must do, as a business owner, innovator and Motherland Mogul, is figure out how you can stand out from your competition. You need to ask yourself: “If I must have competitors, how do I make sure I’m able to stand out? How can I be visible to my potential customers and clients? How can I meet my revenue expectations?” In this article, I’m going to share with you a quick way to combat that. I’ll be sharing two case studies of how companies were able to stand out from the competition by thinking out of the box. [bctt tweet=”Ask yourself the following questions if you want to stand out from the competition” username=”SheLeadsAfrica”] Guideline: How to stand out from the competition First things first, look at the top 10 companies/competition in your industry. Make sure you take note of the following: What are they offering? How do they offer it? What are their price points? How is their customer service? What is their packaging like? Then, ask yourself: What are their strengths? What are they doing that you should emulate? Do they have any weak spots? Is there something they are doing that you can do better? Finally, determine how you can leverage all this information to be different. Ask yourself: How can you do things differently without undermining the value of the products and services you sell? #MotherlandMogul tip: Sometimes, all it takes is improving the experience your customers and clients get doing business with you. Got it? Alright, now to the Case studies. Case Study #1: Rebecca Minkoff Stores I stumbled across an article about Rebecca Minkoff in Inc. Magazine. If you prefer the tl:dr version, here’s the story in a nutshell. Rebecca Minkoff launched her brand of ready-to-wear accessories, handbags, and footwear in 2005. From the start, she knew it won’t survive as a regular store. So, she set out to create the perfect shopper experience. When shoppers enter flagship stores, they are greeted by a digital touchscreen wall that displays the latest runway selections, offers style suggestions from Rebecca Minkoff herself and can even take drink orders. Then, each item contains an RFID tag that detects when a shopper enters a dressing room. When the tag is scanned, an image pops up on a mirror with suggestions for complementary accessories. Talk about innovative. Rebecca Minkoff really did create a unique shopping experience. [bctt tweet=”How to be innovative and come up with new ways to stand out from the competition” username=”SheLeadsAfrica”] Case Study #2: The Trunk Club The Trunk Club is a subscription service for male fashion. Here’s how it works. When you subscribe, a consultant gives you a call and talks with you to find out your “style”. Then, each month, you get a trunk box (miniature size, of course) containing selections for the month. Each item is packed attractively and have price tags on. As the consumer, you have the choice to take what you want and return the rest. Whatever you don’t return, they bill to you. If you can’t imagine how this would work, check out this guy here as he receives his first trunk box. Bottom line is this. The Trunk Club is another innovative way of standing out from the numerous online shopping sites out there. That’s it. Go through the guideline above again and begin to come up with new ways to stand out from the competition. One last thing. The two examples I gave happen to be in the fashion industry, but there are many companies out there in various industries being innovative and coming up with new ways to stand out from the competition. Now, it’s your turn to think outside the box. Go on, I know you can do it! #MotherlandMogul tip: What cool innovative ways have you seen companies use to stand out from the competition? How can you replicate them?