private domain sale
You can set up a local loyalty scheme. Where different towns’ businesses group together and offer reward for local shopping.
You business doesn’t have to be restricted to a single area. The brand locally.co.uk can easily use a multi location website to create schemes for different areas.
You can create a web design business focusing on local businesses.
A local business is relatively easy way to get into web design, as there is always a demand for website. Being local is a great initial selling point.
This domain, locally.co.uk could be a fantastic opportunity for a local SEO specialist.
Google has really made local SEO and important thing, and being a local SEO specialist ca be very lucrative if you get it right.
By using locally.co.uk as your brand you put the benefit of your service right in your potential clients face.
An investment in this domain could be the best thing you will ever make.
They say that local is the new global…
If you sell uk virtual numbers and pushing the local angle twist then this domain, locally.co.uk could be a fantastic asset.
You will have the idea platform to promote local 01 and 02 numbers to your potential virtual phone number clients.
Its sticking power has given rise to much musing about the state of the economy, the high street and so on, as well as discussions about how we shop, where we shop and how city and town centres across the UK will look like in the future.
Flick on the TV and you will come across various shows that (un)helpfully tell or show us where, as business owners, we are going wrong; from chipped paint in your hotel bedrooms to not organising your goods in the shop window in the right way is affecting how your business is doing. Get the basics right, we are told, and everything else will follow.
But then, there are threats and opportunities external to our business that can make and break it, it seems, almost simultaneously. The Internet is a many faced beast; friend and foe, it is the life blood of many a business and yet, some say, it has been a drain on the high street, changing how it will look, forever.
Add to this the tumble and turns of the economy and you have a recipe for both disaster and growth, winners and losers.
The idea that the centre of a city or town is no longer just for shopping, but recreation and socialising too, is slowly catching on but despite consumers searching and finding bargains online, their dismay at seeing row upon row of empty shops is palpable. And so, someone, somewhere came up with the idea of renting a shop on a short term basis and shift a load of stock.
Bingo! A new business model was born and the buying public quite enjoyed the experience. It caught on and thus, several years later, pop up shops are still popping up all over the place.
The concept is simple… it is about renting a space for the short term, to offers your goods and services to a grateful public.
But, its simplicity is deceptive. Although you can think that this is an easy ride, without marketing and an experience, you are missing the point.
An on street/shopping mall/high street presence will allow you to effectively extend your audience from the offline world, to the ‘real’ world too. Brand awareness is something you do need to be taking seriously, expanding your brand psyche in the minds of your buying public.
Nothing is guaranteed, and unless you do take on the advertising and marketing challenges of a pop up shop, then you may be more than disappointed that you did not have the bumper sales you thought you would. However, with advertising and marketing, you can increase sales.
Call it what you will, but when there is a hint of trendiness, buzz or hype about you, your products and services then business can become a whole lot easier. Pop up shops, by their temporary nature, can be the spring board to this buzz. Tell people you really are only there for a short period of time and, as the old saying goes, when it is gone – and you are gone – so are the deals.
However, pop up shops for the online business is a little more than clearing space in the warehouse. It is an opportunity to connect and interact with your customers but, you can still get them to talk about you online. Tap in to your social media presence – run a competition! Anything! – that sparks interested online. The pop up shop can be a powerful, freewheeling PR vehicle.
As if interacting with them isn’t enough, possibly schmoozing with your customer is a great way to find out more about your customer base. What do they like or not like? What causes them hassle? What would they like that is different? How can you solve this problem? In essence, this is how a pop up shop differs from a market stall – it is all about using every single ounce of energy you have to link and connect with your customer.
Every business has a budget. No business, even the very biggest corporations, have a bottomless pit of cash to throw at every little thing thus, getting more for your pound is somewhat essential. Pop up shops can be a great kick start to a marketing campaign, and with decreased rents and other overheads, it is worth considering…
In fact, low rent is something that most businesses find attractive about the pop up shop concept. The economic collapse and recession from 2008 drove many famous names to the wall, and thus, shops on the high street were left sad, bedraggled and empty. Every landlord would rather have 3 months of rent – even if it is reduced – than 3 months of no rent.
No business can stand still. Repositioning and rebranding is something that many businesses, from web designers to fashion designers, are constantly looking to do as they grow and evolve. Rather than just using pop up shops for the same old, same old ‘shift surplus stock’, why not tap into this lucrative market for product development or a pre-launch?
If your product or service has its own season – gifts for Christmas, fashion for summer etc. – then a pop up shop could be a great way of shifting last year’s stock, introducing this years’ and just generally creating a hub-bub around your product and brand.
The story of Australian Jade Ruthven, and the letter she received from her ‘friends’ regarding her supposed over-posting of her tiny daughter’s progress on Facebook saw many people pose the question, can you really post too much on social media? Where is the cut-off point, if there is one? Who decides when it is too much?
Jade Ruthven’s case is a personal one, as opposed to business which is what we address in this article but the letter she received, a copy of which subsequently went viral across the globe, produced a riot of opinions. Interestingly, they all seemed in favour of Ms. Ruthven but the crux of the matter was this – is it possible to post too much and give your audience too much of a good thing? Certainly friends of Ms. Ruthven seem to think so.
How much is too much, in relation to your business and sharing information, news, articles and general updates on social media?
How long is a piece of string?
There are so many questions, so many variables and factors that it can seem almost impossible to answer such a question. No doubt someone, somewhere is working on a magic equation right now but, until that magic formula drops in your inbox, we have scoured the Internet and come up with 5 indicators that you are tweeting and posting just about the right amount of times, not too much and not too little.
OK, you post a tweet, update your status and hit the send button… then you do it again… and then again but it may be that this is not actually doing your business much good.
The question you need to be asking is how is the audience reacting to your tweets etc.? Are you tweets and updates echoing, or just shouting out the once?
What you are looking for are re-tweets, shares, likes, favourites, pins and such like, all indicators that your audience is with you, reading you and understanding you?
If this isn’t happening…
… your followers are either jaded, with an over-kill of tweets and posts or, you are talking to the wrong people.
… and naturally. All too often, you will see accounts pop up that tell you for “$5 you can have 30,000 new followers within 24 hours” or other ludicrous claims. Think quality, rather than quantity.
If your content is spammy and overdone, people stop following. If you don’t tweet or update, people will stop following but, if they like what you do, they will share and re-tweet; their followers will see it and from those followers you may get a handful of people following you.
It is the way that social media works; the clue is in the name – “social”. Be social and appropriate and people will follow you. Your audience needs to grow naturally, and not be forced with sill $5 offers.
This is where you are effectively asking for a favour or two from the high flyers in your industry. A great example is a fledgling furniture company with a unique product – creating furniture from old wine barrels. They tweet, including the high flyers such as @Kevin_McCloud and he re-tweets etc. and the ball starts rolling.
You don’t have to look for just the famous celebrities, but well-known ‘icons’ within your line of business. Getting this type of response can create a much-needed reaction for your business.
There is no right or wrong when it comes to how you use social media in terms of advertising and/or conversation with employees, but the response you get – and how you subsequently respond – will vary… or it should.
Some businesses do use their Twitter feed, for example, as an advertising or marketing space; in this, overdo it with hundreds of tweets a day gets a bit boring, hence people stop following.
However, if you are indulging in conversation with clients, customers and fans, then you can get away with tweeting or posting more. However, unless you have the time, energy and person to tweet and post all of the time, you could possibly never get on with anything useful, ever again.
For those with a serious nature behind their social media presence, it pays to tap into the power of platforms such as Hootsuite or BufferApp. The premium or business services of these platforms allows you to connect all your social media presence together in one place.
You can post the same thing across all your platforms, or lead a campaign on just one to up the followers and shares. Likewise, you can also see from various streams how well your accounts are doing and what real results you are reaping.
In fact, you can see forming before your very eyes your magic formula as to how many tweets and posts are too much, too little or just right.
What do you think is the optimum number of tweets for a business to send in a day? What about other social media platforms?
As much as we love the status quo, there is an interesting visual that shows our comfort zone as being a tiny bubble in the bottom left hand corner of a page but, the sphere where we evolve, grow and create is way beyond this.
You cannot run your company the same way, doing the same thing, over and over again, forever. Times change. People change. Your customers change. You grow.
The boundaries that were once so comforting, are now restricting you. Time has come for change.
For many businesses, this growth means re-branding but before you think this an expensive, potentially disastrous foray in which you will sink without a trace, there is, as always, ways and means of going about such a transformation – and doing so successfully.
Many brands have re-branded and revitalised themselves; take Burberry for example. Once dismissed as gang wear, the likes of Emily Watson now wear the instantly recognisable tartan pattern wear. With many other example of successful re-brands, if the time has come for your business to change, how do you go about it? What have the successful examples and the not-so-successful examples of rebranding taught us?
If you are in business, there will come a point where something has to give – it either grows, or it starts to retract. What was one perfect, is now changing to something different and this inevitably starts with what your market place is demanding. Society changes, as well as needs, demands and expectations and your business, in order to stay a viable business, may need to leap with both hands and grab on to this change.
You need the bigger picture, not just a snapshot view; don’t forget the song that tells us we can only see a piece of sky through a window and that stepping outside expands our view. There is no time like the present to get to grips with a SWOT analysis of your business – what are its strengths and weakness, the opportunities and threats?
If you are rebranding, the likelihood is you have a successful business on your hands, with customers and suppliers with whom you have a great relationship. Talk to them; ask them what they do and don’t like? What’s missing? What do you do well that could be expanded?
You need a mix of qualitative and quantitative market research…
Rebranding essentially means branching out and thus, your portion of the market should be bigger but, within your current confines you will only be looking at a small section of it. Take a leaf from the book of Pepsi – considered by some as the poor relation to Coca Cola, Pepsi has quietly and stealthily buying soft drinks companies that not only diversifies it operations, but increases it market share too. The key question you need to answer is, how has your industry and market changed?
Every company has competition. Every company has allies. The best example of this is the rebranding by Seattle’s Best Coffee, part of the Starbucks brand.
They realised their industry was cluttered, with hundreds of names and logos in which their company was lost. They realised they needed to break out from the crowd and this is where they formed alliances with similar, but not direct competitors.
In the US, Seattle’s Best Coffee is now sold in many different outlets and franchises, including big names such as Subway, Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines, Border’s Bookstores and so on. Their new logo made them stand out as a fun company, appealing to a new clientele.
Rebranding means re-targeting your view of customers. It is not about ditching the old ones, but appealing to new ones too. You may offering very similar services or products, just vamped up and with a wider scope. Don’t forget, even tried and tested customers will look for new, innovative products and delivery.
Do you remember those first heady years of business, where you took the plunge and laid everything on the line? You are going to do it again and, like jumping off that top diving board feet in the air, if you think about it, you will never leap.
Once you have the suggestions you need, have realistically studied the market and impact, you need to make the decision – reposition your business or re-brand? And if you decide rebrand, don’t hesitate… But, now is the time for internal business analysis…
Like a business plan that strategizes where you are going and why, you need to strategize your rebranding. What is wrong and why does it need fixing? Do you have all the facts? Are you making an informed choice? How are you going to do it? Is everybody on board?
Rebranding is just as much an exercise in communication as it is anything else. People need to know you are changing and what this means for them. Harness new ideas – why not create a YouTube clip that explains the new look business? – and stay on with social media channels such as Twitter and Facebook in your current form, whilst creating a crossover to the new brand.
Change is invigorating. Rebranding your business, and growing it to the next level, is a courageous step and one which can reap huge benefits. There are many details to be ironed out, a lot of work to be done but with the right information driving it, a careful thought out strategy, your business can rebrand successfully.
Step 1: Download the app
On Apple you will need to download the app via the App Store or through Google Play for android. Once you have downloaded it you will need to create an account. Like all accounts set up for business, take care which email, password and mobile number you use.
If you have a Twitter account, you can create an account through this social media platform. In fact, this is where you may have come across some short, bite size vines as Twitter acquired the app in October 2012.
This move was greeted with much furore and thus, the use of short video clips have gathered pace in recent years as a result.
Step 2: Your profile
Don’t forget the old, old lesson that creating and completing your profile is essential. Add a few words about your business, using your tag line and logo if you can. Add your location (great for local businesses) and select a profile colour.
You can also use your Twitter contacts on fine to ‘find friends’ in the app.
Step 3: Explore trending vines
Before you go plunging in and create mini-Hollywood blockbusters, take a moment to surf around the app to see what us trending.
You will notice from clicking on ‘home’, and then ‘explore’ that there are different categories of posts and, you will also see that #hashtags can be used on Vine too – perfect for a #hashtag campaign.
Step 4: Communicate
Vine Messages is a way to have video conversation with friends and customers too. You can do this by pressing and holding the camera icon. Don’t forget that you only have a few seconds so it is worth planning on what you intending saying or communicating in a few short seconds.
Top tip – before plunging into online marketing, why not make a few test videos and shares with trusted friends or colleagues?
Step 5: Record and share your own vines!
This is the exciting bit! Bearing in mind #hashtags, and your campaign goals, start creating your vines. Look online for examples created by other companies and how they utilised them. Once complete, don’t forget to share them.
Step 6: Interact
Vine is a social app, just like all those other mediums we use in everyday life. Not only should you be looking to interact with customers and ‘fans’, but take time to interact with other like-minded Vine users too. This way, you build a presence on a great app.
Step 7: Review
You can see how well your Vines are performing by examining your loop count. You can also use other analytics programs online to see how well people interact with Tweets and posts when they do, and when they do not have Vines are part of them.
Step 8: Branch out
Vine can be used on the web too, where you can ‘explore the beautiful world of looping videos’.
Using graphics and visuals such as short pieces of video is proven to have a dramatic effect on engagement rates, as well as being a powerful marketing tool. Why not take a look?
Have you used video, whether through Vine or maybe via YouTube? How did the experience impact on your business?
Follow our 5 minute how to guide and your hashtag could become an almost too-hot-to-handle-social-media-campaign…
Step 1: Find out what YOUR audience is REALLY talking about
There are two key factors here: identifying your audience and what these people are really conversing and discussing. Just because everyone was talking about the recent leader’s debate here in the UK, doesn’t mean your global audience is.
If you sell holidays, why not find out where people are talking about and why… If you are in the food sector, what foodstuffs are people conversing about? What is the latest super food? And how can they get it or use it?
Step 2: Simplicity is key
Hashtags can be used across a variety of social media platforms but checking out massively successful hashtag campaigns and you will see that they use one channel appropriate to them, and kept the ‘how to enter the competition/campaign/exchange’ as low barrier as possible
For example:
Using Twitter
Follow @LocallyHQ
Tell us what you think the most important website ingredient is, using #creativeweb
Be part of the discussion!
No form filling; no subscribing to a newsletter; no navigating to website. Simple.
Step 3: Be social!
However, having a campaign landing page can work well as some customers will want to explore this campaign further. If you run a #hashtag competition, you will need this as there always have to be rules with these things.
But, the overall aim is to be social so why not have a smorgasbord of happy faces, amazing tweets and great ideas or discussion points to inspire others to contribute?
Step 4: Use traditional media too
If you are planning on running a #hashtag campaign, you need to know it is a long term exercise, not one that will instantly light up the world of social media – unless you are very fortunate.
Any offline or traditional marketing you do can be harnessed too, so keep that #hashtag rolling across your newspaper adverts, flyers, posters…
Step 5: Buy online promotion
Buying online promotion is one way to give you #hashtag campaign a bit of a kick start, should the uptake be slow. There is a paid ability on Twitter to promote a hashtag campaign BUT, like all marketing campaigns, going out on a limb will have far less reach than it being part of a strategic marketing plan.
Step 6: Harness real time opportunities
This is a posh way of saying leaping on the bandwagon of positive news. Hi-jacking is something that many other brands and businesses do but always take care that you are using this appropriately. Anything that plays on the misfortune of others is never a good idea – always be positive.
Before you panic and run for the hills, we take a closer look at where and why this data was generated. And this is the focus of our first ‘5 minute read’.
Generated by Chartbeat, an online software analytical application, it looked at media companies. On one hand, this is a broad business model but, every business is different. The headline actually refers to what visitors to your website are actually reading which, in this case, are articles; it does not include home pages, landing pages etc.
However, before we discard this statistic as scaremongering tripe, we need to take a deeper look into what and why people are using or accessing information for.
There are several key points to the study:
The online world is current and fleeting, with the bad stuff hanging around with a penchant for popping up when we least want or expect it – ‘the right to be forgotten‘.
News events that are current, or trends on social media platforms tends to be the type of content that draws in visitors, or according to this pieces of research it is. This study look at a chunk of websites – 2,000 in fact – and monitored 2 billion page views across these websites.
Although this statistic tells us that many visits are fleeting it doesn’t rule out evergreen content as being something we should ditch.
Evergreen content are the articles, blogs and posts that people write on a variety of subjects from the best way to unblock a drain, to the colours to use in marketing your products, services or brand to your customers.
‘Marathon not a sprint‘ is the motto here as evergreen content has proven to be a lead-generator. Newsworthy stuff is all well and good, especially for a quick read but, for the longer term, generating content that is both valuable and useful to the customer/visitor is essential.
The study that generated the ‘15 second’ statistic also found that of the 10,000 articles shared via social media there was no relationship between the amount a piece of content is shared and the amount of attention the average reader gives it.
Before we all throw our laptops out and rip up our content marketing plans, take note of the following:
And here in lies a debate:
The great thing about these kind of reports and studies is that, even though we may not be the same kind of business, we can still take away some great lessons.