Marketing Videos - Types

There are essentially four types of videos for marketing your online business, product, service or yourself. It's easy to learn how to make a video with clips with Amazing Sales Videos. Each type has advantages for your video marketing strategy, but some can be prohibitively expensive while others may look cheap and be ineffective. The following is a quick and easy description of the four types of videos for marketing your online business.

Broadcast Quality Video

A broadcast quality video is a high quality product which could be placed on network television. The production of such a video will usually entail the use of script writers, a producer, a director, and a cast of actors. The end product is usually very impressive but the cost of such a production can be frightening, ranging from $40,000 to $250,000.

Web Quality Video

Web-quality videos for marketing would be similar to broadcast quality in style, however; this is a product in which much of the production is your responsibility, usually requiring you to provide script, imagery, and voice.

The end result might be a bit less polished, but the cost of such a production may be more in line with your budget, usually about $1000 per minute of finished video product. However, the cost in time to you and your staff may be more than you are willing to pay, as you try to generate a quality script and voice. Plus, are you and your staff actors or business professionals?

Do-it-yourself Video

Do-it-yourself video production sites can greatly reduce the cost of using videos for marketing and can be found all over the internet these days. These are basically impersonal slideshow production sites, where you supply all imagery and text. A computer program then plugs your input into a video template with some music.

Many of these services are free of charge, as an inducement to purchasing higher quality, and higher priced, video production services. The major drawback here is, of course, a generic look without compelling personal engagement with your prospect, as well as the name of the site you used being featured in your video, detracting from your message.

Professional Slideshow Video Production

Similar in style to the do-it-yourself production sites, but with professional input and feedback from an actual human being, a professional slideshow video production will offer customized background templates and music scores into which your imagery and text is placed. With this type of video production, you are able to create a much more polished video slideshow in which to promote your product or service.

This type of video also allows for a uniquely tailored approach to your presentation which is targeted to your market, as well as the ability to re-purpose, or re-use, text and imagery already available to you. Further, you own the product, with no promotional material form the production company included in your video.

The cost for such a service is much more reasonable than full production video sites, ranging from about $30 to $150 depending on the length of your video slideshow. Also, professional text production, script writing, and voice-over services may be provided at an additional cost.

For the online marketer, local business, small business owner or entrepreneur, professional slideshow video production tends to be the most cost-effective means for taking the plunge into videos for marketing. Another great idea is learning how to make a video with clips. The use of these services offers professional quality, as well as professional feedback and input into your video marketing strategy, while at the same time helping you to greatly reduce your promotional video cost.

What Is CRM (Customer Relationship Management)?

CRM is short for Customer Relationship Management and is the strategy for managing communication and all interactions with your customers and prospects.

The main goal with having a good strategy for CRM is to be able to find and attract new customers as well as to retain a good relationship with your current customers to make sure they stay with you.

CRM describes the company's overall strategy towards how to manage all interactions with the customers so that measuring of how the strategy works. This means that it is important not only to measure but also to constantly question the strategy to make it more efficient.

CRM is not always as easy as it sounds. Some customers need more attention than others so it is important to categorize the customers into different areas. It is also important to understand that customers need different kind of attention in different phases of the relationship.

To help you with the customer relationship there is CRM Software. The CRM Software will help you to store information about the customer, categorize them in different areas and stages of what kind of relationship you have with the customer at the moment and remind you to perform different activities with the customer. All interactions with the customer should always be stored in the system even when you are trying to get hold of the customer but failed to do so.

Most users of the CRM Software are the sales people. Since they are usually very busy working with selling the products or services it is important that the CRM Software is intuitive and easy to use. It is also important to be able to easy follow up the interactions with flexible and good reports.

Some CRM Software also combine the sales software functionality but it is important to separate the two processes and understand that CRM and sales are different areas. Sales are about the sales process and to handle offers and follow up the sales more based on figures (more will be discussed in the article "What Is Sales") while CRM is more about the more soft sides of the relationship and the interactions.

To help you understand if your strategy is good a great tool is a customer survey. This will not only help you understand if you are treating the customers well but also understand what kind of additional services they prefer.

Some companies try to make the CRM quite complex. This might be good in theory since you are able to bring in as much information as possible. But, the complexity is to no use if the process and the tools are not followed and used by the employees. It is therefore important to think simplicity for the personnel first and then think about how to use this information the best way possible.

By setting up an easy process you will be able to transfer this to your CRM Software. Your employees are going to be able to easily use it and gladly fill in information. This information will be the base for all customers and also the foundation that you can improve and build on.

Creating a strategy for how to take care of your customers all the way from when they are leads throughout the whole customer life cycle is the difference between keeping customers and loosing customers. A company with a good CRM strategy that is constantly improved will improve the possibilities to succeed extremely much. This, combined with a good customer support, will make your company known for wanting to work WITH your customers, which is exactly what customers want.

Combined with a good and user friendly CRM Software you will almost have the perfect recipe for success. At least in making your customers feel comfortable with you.

Five Steps To Become a Succesful Social Media Marketer

Even though Web Marketing hasn’t earned its fair share of recognition among the traditional and family held businesses, it has gained a lot of interest in the marketing world and people are recognizing its potential. One of the best part about being a web marketer is that any body can be one. You just need to have a presence on the Internet and you must have an opinion. Most of the bloggers start with promoting their own blogs and learn the tricks of how to promote through different channels on the web.

Thanks to the numerous social media channels that exist today, web marketing has become easier than ever. Instead of sending thousands of mails to various people, you can just leave an update in your social network which can be seen by thousand of people. Of course the rate of convergence depends on how influential you are in the social media world. If you don't play your cards well, you might just get labeled as a spammer with absolutely zero convergence.

Here are a few things you can do to make yourself heard in social media space:

Listen and Engage

Social Media is all about conversations. Unlike traditional media, social media encourages people to talk rather than just listen. You can not expect people to just listen to your monologue unless you are Britney Spears or Bill Gates. So so listen to people and talk to them. You can keep it completely professional or personal based on your preference. Also make sure that the conversations directed at you never go unattended

Know what you are talking

Unless you are interested in just having conversation about mundane events like what you had for breakfast, you need to be an expert on something. If you promote a tech product, make sure you know it in and out. A fair knowledge of competition and market would be added advantage. On the other hand absolutely no knowledge about the product would make you loose your audience.

Targeted Network

Though it does help to have a huge network, it can be completely useless if it has no interest in what you sell. Your network must have a good number of target audience. Also make sure to increase your network at a healthy pace. The better the quality of your network, the higher are your chances of conversion. Networking sites such as Twitter are dominated by spammers and bots who do not add any value but only add noise in your stream.

Social Profile Management

Manage your profiles well and try keeping it consistent over various networks. In the Social Media word people know you by your profile name and then it becomes important that you have the same profile name across platforms. It is also important to manage your profiles well. Your profile should be kept up to date, clean (free of spammers). One of the most important part of your profile is your picture/image. You should come across as human and not a bot and not having an image is a complete no no.

Be Regular and Responsive

Social Media is all about being regular. You have to be in the network regularly for your network to notice you. If you don’t update for a long time, you tend to get lost in the crowd. Since social media is about real time, it is very important to be responsive. Since something that needs your immediate attention may loose its relevance 'cause of the real time effect. Social Media site like Twitter is known for the viral effect. One bad word can completely kill a brand if necessary action is not taken immediately.

Website Optimization

When it comes to getting customers through the internet there is a lot more to consider than simply having a website built and registered with the search engines. This really should only be seen as the first step and of far more importance is how well the site is optimised and in particular for the Google search robots. In simple terms your website must be as Google friendly as possible if you want to be found on the front page of any search results. This also means that the content must be highly relevant for the customer and the structure of your website must allow a visitor to easily move around the site. This area of expertise is known as "on page optimisation" and is most visible to online visitors.

However, by far the largest and most important area of website optimisatiojn occurs "off the page" and involves special robot friendly computer instructions as well as incoming links to your website from other independant websites which Google views as a vote of confidence in the content you are presenting to the public.

In order to see your website "rank higher on google" action needs to be taken across all the above mentioned areas if you want to consistently rank on the front page of search results and see your business prosper online and your enquiries and sales to both grow month on month.

Recent research amongst leading SEO figures has led to the present day opinion that Google has shifted the weighting factors of its famous logarithm to better represent the true authority of a given website. The main change has been a slight down grading in the importance of the actual url or domain name in favour of social media rankings. Google now takes account of Twitter and Facebook comments and tags. So in future, any business serious about having a consistently high search ranking will have to have social media bookmarking on their sites as well as a corporate Facebook and Twitter account.

Successful online marketing in the 21st Century will become more diverse so don't ignore progress.

What Is the Point of Social Bookmarking?

I'm often asked what exactly social bookmarks are, why they are important, and how they are beneficial for SEO. They are a great tool for search engine optimization, because it was never meant to become one. Social bookmarking's original purpose was to be able to save your bookmarked/favorite websites to a website, such as Digg or Del.icio.us, so you can access these bookmarks later from a different location.


The reason it has become a marketing strategy is that your bookmarks are visible to others, meaning they have the potential of following the same sites you do. People that follow your sites can spread the bookmarks you create and as the popularity grows your site's traffic will grow, giving them the potential of any other social network's virality.


There is always the potential you will never draw significant traffic from social bookmarks directly, but that's okay as it is only half their purpose. The real beauty is the fact that you have control over a great link back to your site. As others follow your bookmarks they are also providing free one-way links from their own social bookmarking pages. So even if the traffic from the bookmarks is slow you have the added benefit of a linking campaign providing solid links to your site, increasing your site's ranking in the search engines.


Hopefully you can see the value and power of social bookmarks. Remember, while you don't want to base your SEO campaign on bookmarks you definitely do not want to leave them out.

What Is LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is a community of knowledgeable experts from around the globe. Once you become a member of it, you build a user profile that summarizes your specialized knowledge and achievements. You will find, be launched to, and work together with skilled specialists you will want to work with to achieve your goals.


This skilled social networking giant was launched in December 2002 and was formally unveiled for general public use in May 2003. LinkedIn is available for global use and also as of August 2010 LinkedIn documented more than seventy five million users. Furthermore, it permits them to manage the way they are identified by the world wide web - LinkedIn ranks very well in Google, therefore it is your LinkedIn user profile which will be shown initially should you research your name.


LinkedIn is considerably more targeted, it really is specifically considering business associations. LinkedIn features an organized structure that enables you to enter in your resume. The organized data format allows LinkedIn to respond to questions like "Indicate me all the individuals I'm connected to who presently work for company X and live in area Y."


Linkedin has 70+ million members in 200 international locations and associates from 170 industrial sectors, which includes all Fortune 500 companies. It can be useful for career research and job research,to get maximum guidance or details from business experts, to locate prospective clients or business partners by firms, to distribute employment opportunities by headhunters, research the community for possible applicants and screen prospects prior to job interviews.


Creating a user profile on Linkedin does not always mean you might be employment searching, so you do not have to be worried about linking with individuals at your present employment. Nevertheless, you are able to restrict access to user profile details should you desire.


Most social networking sites began catering to one market and after that increased into massive global networks catering to numerous viewers. LinkedIn is centered on the corporate world and they're consistently incorporating additional features for their website to learn effectively to speak with prospective customers and acquaintances.


LinkedIn is a very smart way to get in touch. Be sure that your user profile consists of your background, achievements, and don't overlook a very good user profile photograph. This is actually significant. Individuals are interested in a face. It's important any time they setup a meeting with you at a social networking function, your contacts know your identify.


LinkedIn is really a well-liked professional social networking website -- take a look at http://www.linkedin.com -- that permits you to publish a user profile of your respective professional pursuits, your education and learning, as well as your other pursuits. After that it enables you to "link" with acquaintances, close friends, and family members, developing a community of relationships.


I've discovered LinkedIn as a beneficial strategy to sustain connection with acquaintances who may have progressed to new work opportunities or who you work together with now, to get back in contact with individuals you might have stumbled upon at all levels of school as well as in a variety of organizations, as well as to connect with family members. After that it enables you to "link" with fellow workers, close friends, and family members, developing a community of relationships.


LinkedIn's customs is extremely professional so in order to use LinkedIn properly, your improvements, queries and existence have to be professionally instead of privately focused. In the event you just use a single social network website, or social media marketing device, then LinkedIn really should be it.

Facebook For Business

Facebook is a powerful marketing tool that businesses are now embracing as part of their advertising. It is a medium that cannot be ignored by business owners and is one that we all need to be aware of and know how to use.


Facebook is a powerful marketing tool that businesses are now embracing as part of their advertising. It is a medium that cannot be ignored by business owners and is one that we all need to be aware of and know how to use. The question that I often hear people ask is "Why should I use Facebook for my business?" As an online business owner of a gift boxes and hampers business, I am always looking for new ways to promote my business. Facebook is a social networking media that is a powerful tool used to communicate with people of all ages.


Facebook is free to use unless you choose to pay for an advertisement. By regularly sharing on your Facebook page, you'll end up with more people accessing your page, more subscribers (if they like what they see) and hopefully more paying customers. Facebook is a public site so you can link your Facebook page and your website, allowing easy access to both.


Your Facebook page can be personalized to reflect your business and who you are. How much personal information that you give out about yourself is entirely up to you but including some personal background helps to make your business more personable.
Facebook used to be the domain of Generation Y but is now being used by people of all ages. It is a place where you can build relationships with your existing customers and prospective customers. By "talking" to these people via your Facebook page, you can learn more about them and about what they want. This can then be used to change or vary your marketing and the services that you offer, which in turn will provide people with more of what they want.


In January 2011, Facebook had more than 600 million registered users so accessing business individuals that you may not have previously had access to is a real possibility. Beginning a conversation online with another entrepreneur can create business networks that are essential for all businesses, especially small businesses.


Facebook is relatively easy to navigate, negating the need for someone else to manage your page. You can share the management of your Facebook page with someone else using the administrator feature or you can manage it on your own. We've all heard the saying that "a picture speaks a thousand words," and Facebook is no exception. You can easily manage photo albums to showcase your individual products and promotions, thus enhancing your page.


A Facebook Business Page ensures your business presence on the web and is a tool that cannot be ignored. Your competition is using it and as with all tools that are available to promote your business, this is one more good idea that can help you to interact with your current customers and prospective clients.
Give it a go. After all, you've got nothing to lose.

What Is Cloud Computing

Most computer users today are already using cloud computing. Do you use Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo email: congratulations you are in the cloud. If you are reading this you are in the cloud: the Internet is the cloud.


Way back in the day, your computer's hard drive was the repository for all your digital information. Emails, photos, documents were all stored inside your computer. Cloud computing changes the way you store your digital information: your emails are no longer stored on your computer, but exist only on Google's servers (think hard drive) if you use Gmail, or Microsoft's servers if you use Hotmail, etc.


The benefits of using the cloud to store your information should be obvious: you can check your email from your computer, your smart phone, any computer connected to the web, etc. With cloud computing your information is readily available on a wide range of devices as long as you have an Internet connection. If your computer crashes and can not be repaired you will not lose your emails: they were never stored on your computer. Cloud computing will mean never having to say your sorry worry about moving all your programs and data to a new computer (obscure movie reference deleted). Plug the new computer in, get online, and your data and programs are available.


The downside of using the cloud to store your information should also be obvious: lack of service. If your Internet connection goes down or the server housing your information crashes, you will have no access to your stuff until the problem is repaired. Do you risk loosing all your stuff forever if you use the cloud? If you are dealing with a reputable company with a solid background in cloud computing (Google, Amazon, etc.) temporary outages will occur, but data loss should not be a problem. Hackers have and will continue to attack the cloud: large databases with personal information are a rich target. Will your stuff be 100% safe in the cloud? No. Will you have an alternative if you want to live with all the conveniences the cloud offers: no. Think of the problem of cloud safety this way: would you stop driving a car because a certain number of people are killed in accidents every year?


Cloud computing will eventually offer every software program now available (accounting programs like QuickBooks, web publishing programs like DreamWeaver). Rumours are floating around that Windows 8 will be heavily based in the cloud, Apple is busy developing iCloud, and Google Chromebooks (web only laptops) have already been released.


For better or worse the cloud is already here.