Search results

If you’re unfamiliar with the world of Reddit, you are missing out on some serious internet pleasure (as well as a great marketing strategy when creating your website). Known for its sense of humor, niche communities and willingness to tackle controversial topics, Reddit offers features that other social media platforms simply don’t. But before we can get into why Reddit is so popular, let’s get into what it is. What is Reddit? Founded in 2005 by a couple of students with some time on their hands, Reddit is home to one of the most vibrant, clever, and hilarious communities online, numbering hundreds of millions of visitors each month. Reddit is known for its vast array of communities, or "Subreddits," dedicated to virtually every topic imaginable. Whether you're interested in cats, cooking or cryptocurrency, there's a Subreddit for you. In each Subreddit, members post forum-like threads of content—it could be a link, a story, a photo, a survey etc.—accumulating replies as well as “up” or “down” votes to rate the quality of the post. The end result is a multitude of original and fun content that will take up hours of your day if you don’t practice self-control. To illustrate more clearly what makes Reddit so addictive, we compiled a list of our favorite Reddit qualities. Why Reddit is so popular Because it's not about showing off Because of the AMA Subreddit Because you learn so much Because it's a community Because Redditors have the best and craziest humor 01. Because it's not about showing off Restroom selfies? Not here. Unless you’re going for sarcasm, that is. Reddit is not a social network that encourages (or imposes) the type of non-stop exhibitionism that you find on so many other social platforms. A Redditor’s profile only shows you their previous threads and their ranking—no relationship status, business CV or anything like that. 02. Because of the AMA Subreddit Ask Me Anything is one of the most popular and intriguing sections on the site. Anyone can go on it, present a certain aspect of their life and take questions from the audience. The interactions vary from a self-proclaimed “extreme couponer” being asked if store clerks hate him to Former president Barack Obama being asked to share the recipe for the White House beer. These questions can also answer very practical day-to-day things like how to make a website or what to make for dinner. Social media engagement is especially high on Reddit exactly because of interesting, and potentially controversial, Subreddits like these. 03. Because you learn so much There’s a reason why Reddit is so popular with the nerdy slice of the world’s population. It’s an incredible source of information on pretty much every field of human knowledge. You can browse through the many Subreddits in philosophy, languages, coding, molecular gastronomy or whatever makes your mind hungry. Our recommendation: Don’t skip the Today I Learned Subreddit, which contains hours of fun, enlightening and sometimes utterly useless trivia bits. 04. Because it's a community Reddit has a bad reputation for being filled with trolls and anonymous weirdos. While these users are definitely around, they are not representative of the majority of Redditors at all. You will find people giving free legal advice, comforting others in pain, helping members to organize surprises for loved ones and many other kind acts. Need proof? Our favorite for the moment is this guy soliciting photos from around the world to make a special engagement proposal to his sweetheart. You can also find niche communities to fit specific interests. This helps when you want to promote yourself because your target audience is probably already there. Strengthen your social media marketing strategy by being an active member, posting and commenting. 05. Because Redditors have the best and craziest humor A group of people get together to count up to a million. This is not a social experiment, it’s a Reddit pastime. The counting games are just one example of the wacky and hilarious fun that Reddit brings out of people. On another occasion, a “test post, please ignore” thread got over two thousand snarky comments. Reddit is truly where some of the strangest and funniest social media trends come about. If these seem too random for you, don’t worry about it. You’ll definitely crack up at this thread of parents sharing their kids’ funniest moments, or at the Not The Onion Subreddit for news that is too crazy to be true. You’re also sure to discover the latest memes and gifs while you’re at it. Why Reddit is so popular FAQ

It’s not a matter of if you should be advertising your business, but how you should advertise it. Even the most common aspect of your brand, like when you build your own website, is essentially an ad that lives on the Internet 24/7. That said, for the most part, people aren’t on your website for hours on end. Where do people spend hours at a time, specifically in terms of Internet usage? YouTube. YouTube is one of the most popular video outlets in existence, and it offers its own advertising platform, allowing you to get in front of your audience in ways your website simply can’t. YouTube advertising can be tricky for small businesses, which can lead to wasting your precious dollars earned if you don’t know what to look out for. To alleviate this, we’re going to show you how to get started with the platform and run your own campaigns from end to end. Why advertise on YouTube? Advertising on YouTube can be a strategic and effective way for businesses to reach and engage with their target audience. Here are the top 5 reasons why businesses choose to advertise on YouTube: Massive user base: YouTube boasts billions of users globally, presenting an unparalleled opportunity for businesses to reach a vast and diverse audience. Advertising on YouTube allows businesses to tap into this massive user base and extend their brand visibility to millions of potential customers. Visual engagement: Video content on YouTube is highly engaging, providing businesses with a dynamic and visually appealing platform to showcase their products or services. Video ads can capture attention more effectively than static ads, fostering a deeper connection with the audience. Precise targeting options: YouTube's robust targeting options enable businesses to reach their ideal audience with precision. Advertisers can tailor their campaigns based on demographics, interests, behaviors and more. This targeted approach ensures that ads are shown to the most relevant viewers, maximizing the impact of the advertising investment. Versatile ad formats: YouTube offers a variety of ad formats, allowing businesses to align their advertising strategy with specific marketing objectives. Whether aiming for brand awareness, engagement or conversions, advertisers can choose from skippable ads, non-skippable ads, display ads and more to suit their campaign goals. Detailed analytics: YouTube provides comprehensive analytics and performance metrics, offering valuable insights into the effectiveness of advertising campaigns. Advertisers can track key metrics such as views, click-through rates and impressions. This data empowers businesses to refine and optimize their ad strategies for better results and a higher return on investment. The different YouTube ad video formats Before you jump headfirst into a YouTube marketing campaign, you should learn about the options that are available for you to take advantage of. While there are many options for making money on YouTube, video ads are the most popular ad format for the video-centric platform. Don’t worry, though. We’ll have more information about non-video ad formats below. Here’s a rundown of all the different video formats and ways to advertise on YouTube: TrueView Ads: TrueView ads are more than likely the format that you’re most familiar with. They come in multiple variations: In-stream: The most common type of TrueView ad, which can appear in the beginning, middle, or end of a YouTube video. These videos can be skipped after five seconds of the ad has played and they’re accompanied by a companion banner ad on the right hand side of the screen on desktop. Video Discovery Ads: These video ads appear in YouTube search results and next to related videos. These types of ads are unobtrusive and relevant to the user’s search query. For the above options, advertisers only pay for TrueView ads when users watch for at least 30 seconds, watch an entire short video, or interact with an ad in some way, such as clicking on a call-to-action. However, there’s another TrueView format that does things a little differently. TrueView for Reach: If your primary goal is ad reach and not necessarily ad views, then TrueView for Reach is something you’ll want to consider. These ads are optimized for a wide reach across large audiences and are charged on a CPM (cost per 1,000 impressions) basis. Other YouTube ad video formats: Non-Skippable video ads: Probably the most maligned ad format. These 15-20 second ads cannot be skipped and must be viewed before the YouTube video plays. These ads can also appear in the middle or after videos as well. Bumper ads: Bumper ads are another common video ad format. They’re 'unskippable' six-second ads that must be viewed before a YouTube video plays. Since YouTube is the world’s largest site for hosting and consuming video content, we will primarily be focusing on video ads in this tutorial, but don’t worry, we’ll have additional information on non-video formats further down. How to set up your first YouTube advertising campaign Ready? Here are all the vital steps you need to take in order to successfully advertise on YouTube: Start your YouTube channel Create your Google Adwords account Link Adwords to YouTube Choose your campaign goals and types Set up your campaign Define the people you want to reach Upload your marketing video Save and submit your ad 01. Start your YouTube channel Before you can get started advertising on the platform, you’ll first need to start your YouTube channel for your business. Sure, it’s technically an easy process to actually create the account, but there are many aspects that need to be addressed. From getting the correct art resolution to your intro video, we have the perfect step-by-step guide for you on how to start a YouTube channel. You'll need to consider things like your content niche and your Youtube channel name. 02. Create your Google Adwords account This process is going to be a little confusing for some, and it’s a bit counter-intuitive. In order to create a Google Adwords account, you will essentially be forced to create a campaign that you may never use - and certainly not for the purposes of this article, anyway. What the setup process is attempting to do is helping you to familiarize yourself with Google Ads. Still, it’s forcing its intent on you when you already have your own, so just push through and you will then be able to delete the ad from the dashboard. Sign into an existing or create a new Gmail account. Follow the steps to create your first campaign, including: Advertising goal: Get more calls, physical location visits, website visits, etc. Advertising area: Where most of your customers reside. Product or service details. During the setup, you’ll be asked to create your first ad. Again, this is just a part of the initial configuration and you won’t have to go through with it. You’ll be able to add your own graphics here, but given that you will most likely not be using this ad, feel free to skip along. What you’re really looking for is the main Google Adwords dashboard, which looks like this: Seeing something different on your dashboard? You may have the older dashboard view. You can find out how to switch between the new and previous Google Ads dashboards in just a couple of clicks. 03. Link AdWords to YouTube After your Adwords account is created, you must then link it to your YouTube one before you can begin running video campaigns. The process is very straightforward and shouldn’t take you more than a minute or two. Sign into your YouTube channel. Click your profile icon at the top right corner of the page. Select ‘Creator Studio’. On the left, select ‘Channel’, then click ‘Advanced’. Click ‘Link a Google Ads Account’ under ‘Google Ads Account Linking’. Follow the instructions and then click ‘Finish’. *After this setup is complete, the owner of the Google Adwords account (likely you) will need to approve the request to successfully link the YouTube channel to Adwords. Seeing something different on your YouTube account? You can follow the instructions for different versions of YouTube here. Now it’s time to get started with creating your very own video campaign. There are several steps to the process but it primarily contains choosing your goal, your audience, your format, and your budget. Let’s begin: 04. Choose your campaign goals and types The first question is an obvious one. To start your campaign, you will first need to choose a primary goal. The options available are easy enough to understand, though some will not offer video ads in the section below. For this tutorial, we’re going to choose ‘Brand Awareness and Reach’, but we encourage you to view all of the options you have available to you. A description of each goal that allows video advertising and what they’re for is best given by Adwords itself: Sales: Drive sales online, in app, by phone, or in store. Leads: Get leads and other conversions by encouraging customers to take action. Website traffic: Get the right people to visit your website. Product and brand consideration: Encourage people to explore your products or services. Brand awareness and reach: Reach a broad audience and build awareness. Create a campaign without a goal’s guidance: Use any available campaign type and construct a campaign step-by-step without a goal's recommendations. Next, you’ll be asked to select your campaign type. Your campaign type determines how and where your customers see your ads. As mentioned above, depending on what goal you choose, different options will yield in the campaign type section. Some options will have four and some will have fewer. This article is focusing on video advertising with YouTube, so ‘video’ should be selected - but if you’re going for a different ad format, adapt your selection accordingly. Up next is the campaign subtype. The options here will also be different depending on the goal and campaign type you’ve chosen. For all intensive purposes, choosing ‘Brand Awareness and Reach’ for your goal and then ‘Video’ for your type will yield more familiar ad options for the subtype, like ‘skippable in-stream ads’, ‘bumper ads’, and ‘non-skippable in-stream ads’. Keep in mind that the type and subtype you choose will affect your bidding strategy, as some options only allow for specific strategies. 05. Set up your campaign Name: The following page starts easy enough. Simply name the campaign to your liking. This will only be seen by you and whoever else may have access to manage the campaigns, so feel free to call it whatever you want. Of course, this is the beginning of your foray into YouTube advertising, so you should probably start with your best foot forward and provide a structure for your campaign title. This will also make it quicker and easier to find them later down the line. When creating a name, make sure that the title is appropriate and describes the campaign well. Budget: After you name the campaign, you’ll be asked to set up the budget. Here, you can choose how much money you’d like to invest. You can select a daily amount of money to spend or total amount for the entire campaign. If you’re new to this, and we assume you are, it’s best to start with a low daily budget. This will ensure that you’re not overspending on a campaign that’s not optimized or produces none of the results you’re looking to achieve. Date: Now, the most self-explanatory part of setting up a campaign with Google AdWords: The date. This gives you the option to choose whether you want to have the campaign go live as soon as it’s been approved, or if you’d like to schedule it for some time in the future. Networks, language, and location: Following down the funnel, you’ll be asked where you want your video ad to be displayed. Keep in mind that the networks can change according to your goal type. Your options are YouTube Search Results, YouTube videos, and video partners on the Display Network. For the most part, you’ll probably only want to choose one of the first two, though YouTube Search Results is confined to Discovery ads only. The option for video partners on the Display Network is not recommended mostly due to the fact that you won’t actually know where your ad is running. Moving along, you’ll then need to choose your language, which should be easy enough. Then choose a location you’d like your campaign to run in. You can go very broad and market to multiple countries, or as limited to just a single city. You can also exclude specific locations here as well. Content exclusions: There’s a lot of content on YouTube and not all of it is going to be aligned with your industry or message. While the control on this is rather limited, you can exclude specific types of videos so your ad doesn’t show up on them. This section is broken down a few times, starting with ‘Inventory type’. There are three different inventory types that consist of Expanded inventory, Standard inventory, and Limited inventory. As the names suggest, the Expanded inventory is the most lenient on profanity, sexually suggestive, or violent content where Limited is the least. You can further drill into specific types of content that you’d like to opt out of. Lastly, you may exclude content that has a specific TV rating, like TV-MA or TV-T, along with different types of videos like live streams, embedded videos, and games. Additional settings: Below the content exclusion section is a small link that simply says ‘Additional settings’. Here lies the options for device targeting, frequency capping, and ad scheduling. Device targeting: This allows you to choose what devices your ad will be displayed on, like computers, tablets, mobile devices, and TVs. Frequency capping: Frequency capping shouldn’t be tucked away like the way it is. This allows you to limit the number of impressions or views from the same user. Not using this could result in continually showing your ad to someone who is not interested, which in turn is a waste of money for you. Ad scheduling: While you’ve already scheduled the day you want your campaign to go live, the ‘Ad Scheduling’ section allows you to drill in a bit further, allowing for a fully customized schedule. You can set up multiple times within a day for the campaign to go active. 06. Define the people you want to reach Essentially the most important part of your campaign, your Ad Group is a “group” of people with a specific set of demographics and personal interests, along with target keywords you define for them. Below is a rundown of what you can expect to find in the Ad Group section, along with some helpful tips to see how the choices here affect how and where your ad is displayed. Much like your campaign, you may want to reuse the Ad Group you create, so you should name it. After you’ve named your group, select your demographics, which include age, gender, parental status, and household income. Now, to keep things on the simple side for your first video campaign, we suggest you choose either an audience or a topic. Of course, you can dig in and choose both or multiples of both, but it will essentially complicate who and what videos your ads will display on. That’s why we encourage to choose one or the other in the beginning to get your feet wet and get more advanced as you go forward. Audience: Your audience is (obviously) who your ads will be shown to. This section can be made simple or highly elaborate by adding detailed demographics and interests. Your target audience can be as simple as “book loves” or as elaborate as some who is married, is currently in college, is married, and has an interest in books and gaming. Topics: Topics specifically pertain to the types of videos your ads will show on. With essentially endless forms of content on YouTube, this section can also get fairly elaborate as well. This means anyone who views a video of your selected topic may see your ad. While both audiences and topics can be highly detailed within their own sections, they can work well together. As we mentioned above, it will make things a bit more complicated for the newcomer, but it’s also okay to choose one audience type and one topic to narrow your Ad Group down. Understanding the relationships between your Ad Group choices When adding details about your ad group, as mentioned above, it may seem like a fairly straightforward process. It is and it isn’t. We’ve provided some examples below to show you how your choices in the Ad Group section affect who your ad is shown to and what types of videos it will run on. To best illustrate the relationships between Demographics, Audiences, Topics, and Placements, see the examples below. The following example details how an ad would be displayed if you’ve chosen one topic and one audience type. Example 1: Let's say you set your categories as such: Demographics - males 18-25 Topic - video games Audience - Website builder. The result of these selections would have your ad shown to 18-25 year old males that are interested in website builders and watching videos about video games. The following example details how an ad would display if multiple topics are chosen. Example 2: Let's say you have set your categories as such: Demographics - males 18-25 Topic - video games, website builder. The result of these selections would have your ad shown to 18-25 year old males either watching videos about website builders or video games. The following example details how an ad would display if multiple audiences are chosen Example 3: Let’s say your categories are as such: Demographics - 18-25 males Audience - video games, website builder. The result of these selections would have your ad shown on any video to 18-25 year old males who are interested in video games or website builders. With the examples above, you can see how quickly choosing multiple audiences and topics can become a murky situation. It’s completely okay to go the simple route on your first video campaign. Practice will only allow you to become more confident going forward. 07. Upload your marketing video The moment is finally here - it’s time to add your video creative. This should be as easy as copying the URL of your video and pasting it if you’ve already uploaded it to YouTube. If you’ve yet to upload your video and need some YouTube 101 along the way, we have a handy guide on how to upload your video to YouTube. Your selected ad type will determine how much of it is going to be viewed before the option to dismiss it, unless you’ve chosen a six-second bumper ad or a non-skippable ad format. This will most likely be five seconds for TrueView ads. For these skippable ads, it’s best to send a concise and straightforward message at the beginning. This way, someone who may be already readying their mouse to skip the ad will still get a gist for what you’re all about. After you’ve uploaded your video, there are a few things you can tweak for how it’s displayed. You’ll see a view for how your ad will look on both desktop and mobile on the right panel and you can add a URL and call to action text here as well. This is a vital piece that should not be ignored. For in-stream ads, you’ll also be asked if you’d like to upload a photo as a companion banner that will appear to the right side of the video for viewers on desktops. Foregoing this option will result in the banner image becoming that of your channel’s banner image. 08. Save and submit your ad After you’ve uploaded your video, added your call-to-action, and add a banner for your ad, simply click the ‘Save and continue’ option. Now, take a breath. You’re done creating your first video ad campaign! Notes on YouTube’s approval policy Your ad must be approved to ensure it checks out against AdWords policies. It will then automatically go live either when you’ve scheduled it or if you’ve chosen to have it launched right after it’s approved. The approval process is in place to ensure that an ad is safe and appropriate. The ad itself, the keywords used, and the landing pages linked to the ad are all reviewed to ensure they adhere to the policies of the platform. Existing campaigns that are edited must also go through the approval process once more to check that the changes pass. Usually the review process can take anywhere between a few hours to one business day. More complex ads take longer to review, but they are reviewed within the order they are received. The non-video YouTube ads formats As mentioned above, video ads aren't the only way you can promote your business on YouTube. If you’re not ready to make your own films to advertise on the video giant, take a look at the following formats to start out with: Sponsored card ads: Sponsor cards are exactly what they sound like. Small card-shaped images will appear on the side of a video before they slide away into the corner. This allows the viewer to know where to access them again if they want to. They’re displayed alongside relevant videos or display products mentioned in the video so you can purchase them yourself if you want to. They can be accessed again by clicking the icon that constantly shows at the top right hand corner of the video. Overlay ads: Another common ad format. That’s a small banner that can be closed at the bottom portion of a video you’re watching. The official specs (resolution) of Overlay ads are 468x60 or 728x90 pixels. Display ads: While a handful of the ads above are also considered Display ads, the “official” description is an ad that appears to the right hand side of the video player of the video and above the video suggestions list. The official specs (resolution) of these ads are 300x250 or 300x60 pixels. 10 tips to optimize your YouTube ad campaigns You have now mastered the technical process of launching your YouTube advertising campaigns. There are still some things you can do to make the most out of every penny you spend on the platform: 01. Measure the success of your ads After you’ve created your ad, you’ll want to know whether it’s doing good or bad. There are several key performance metrics that can be used to measure how an ad is doing, like views, watch time, engagements, and so forth. You can use the primary goal of the ad to check if the metrics produce satisfactory results, but you have a wealth of knowledge that you can use to improve future campaigns available to you. Above all, keep in mind that your ultimate key metric will usually be the new customers you bring to your business, so ensure that the campaign is aligned with this goal. 02. Refine your audience If you find yourself not reaching the right audience, you may want to go back and refine your Ad Group or create a slightly different one to see if your click or view rates improve. You can drill very far down to find a very specific audience, including demographics, household income, and personal interests. On the flip side, getting hyper specific can lead to increased competition, which can increase your cost per view. 03. Avoid creative fatigue Even if you’ve perfectly targeted your audience, if they see the same ad too often, it will likely lose its effectiveness and possibly become annoying for the user, even if it’s relevant to them. This is called creative fatigue and it can best be avoided by having multiple video ads that you can swap one out for another. This can also help improve your view rate. 04. Refine your creative if necessary If your ad isn’t as effective as you expected it to be even after you’ve made changes to your audience, you may want to look to your video creative next. Something as simple as shortening the ad, changing the intro, or removing the call to action can help the ad’s effectiveness. 05. Add the Google Ads Conversion pixel to your site If your ads lead to your business website, adding a conversion pixel can provide a wealth of information. Adding this tracking tag to your Wix site will allow you to see whether a click on your ad leads to purchases, downloads, or any of your other goals. 06. Experiment with multiple ad formats While it’s understandable that someone fresh out of their first video campaign wouldn’t want to rush into something else, you should! This will only enable you to become more familiar with the platform. It’s also a great opportunity to see if specific types of video ads work better for you than others. Perhaps Discovery video ads perform better than your Bumper ads? You’ll never know until you give out multiple formats and find out for yourself. 07. Don’t be afraid to get weird Remember, this is YouTube. This is a platform where you can fall into a rabbit hole of the most bizarre videos and come out of it a different person, for better or worse. The point is that people come to YouTube with the expectation of learning something or being entertained, so don’t be afraid to try to make your video ads do both. Show off the weird and funny side of your brand, as these are ads that will be remembered. 08. Incentivize the right people If someone isn’t interested in your ad, they’re going to skip it. That’ll probably happen a lot, so get used to it. That said, someone genuinely interested in your product or service that watches your ad to completely still may need an extra push to take the plunge and perform the click over. This is why you can provide a special offer later on towards your video, far away from the 5 seconds that go by before you can skip the ad. 09. Consider adding captions Not only do captions help those hard of hearing, but also people who don’t want to have audio where they are but still watch a video. (Think about being on a bus.) Providing your own transcription of your ad can be more helpful than you may think and could even improve your SEO ranking for the video. 10. Get advanced As someone new to YouTube Advertising, you may steer clear of the advanced options, but you shouldn’t! Features like frequency capping will limit the number of times a viewer sees your particular ad, which can help expose your ad to new people. This combined with the scheduling feature that allows you to set the specific times your ad shows can be a highly effective way to get your ad in front of new eyes. How much do YouTube ads cost? The cost of YouTube ads can vary widely based on several factors, and advertisers have flexibility in setting their budgets. The key factors influencing the cost of YouTube ads include: Ad format: Different ad formats on YouTube come with varying costs. For example, TrueView ads, which are skippable video ads, typically operate on a cost-per-view (CPV) basis, where advertisers pay when a viewer watches at least 30 seconds of the ad or engages with it. Non-skippable ads may have a cost-per-thousand-impressions (CPM) pricing model. Bidding strategy: YouTube ads operate on an auction-based system. Advertisers can choose their bidding strategy, such as maximum CPV or maximum CPM bids. The bid amount, along with the relevance and quality of the ad, influences whether the ad gets displayed and how often. Targeting options: The specificity of your target audience influences costs. Highly targeted campaigns may have a higher cost because they are reaching a more defined and potentially competitive audience. Broad targeting may result in lower costs but might be less focused. Ad placement: The placement of your ad matters. In-stream ads that appear before, during or after other videos might have different costs compared to video discovery ads that appear in YouTube search results or next to related videos. Industry and seasonality: The industry you operate in can impact ad costs. Competitive industries may have higher costs due to increased demand for ad space. Additionally, seasonality can affect costs, with certain times of the year being more competitive for advertisers. Geographic targeting: Targeting specific regions or countries can affect costs. Advertising in regions with higher demand or larger audiences may result in higher costs per view or impression. Ad quality: YouTube rewards high-quality, relevant ads with better visibility and potentially lower costs. Advertisers with engaging content and high click-through rates may see more favorable pricing. It's important for advertisers to set a daily or campaign budget to control spending. Advertisers are charged when viewers interact with the ad (e.g., by watching a certain portion of it, clicking on it or taking another desired action). While there is no fixed cost for YouTube ads, advertisers have control over their budgets and can adjust them based on their advertising goals and financial constraints.

The world of marketing is beautifully complex - it’s flooded with choices about which channels to use and which customers to target. This wide range of options is responsible for much of the effectiveness of modern-day marketing. However, it’s also part of the challenge. Indeed, it’s easy to get lost in a tangle of different platforms and campaigns, making it hard to track our efforts and find out what really works. Marketing attribution is the answer to this problem. It involves untangling this complexity using mathematical models and concrete data. While this may sound daunting, it’s actually quite simple. In fact, many platforms - from dedicated attribution software to your very own website builder - automate the process for you (see AI marketing automation for inspiration). By providing you with the information about which marketing campaigns drive conversions, these tools give you valuable insights that you can translate into a marketing strategy. Here’s everything you need to know about marketing attribution for your business, including its benefits, the different types of attribution models and how to get started. What is marketing attribution? Marketing attribution is the method of identifying which marketing touch points lead a user to convert. By choosing from a variety of attribution models, you can evaluate which pathways - whether it’s a Facebook promotion, banner ad or email marketing campaign - successfully persuade customers to convert to leads or make a purchase. You can gain a better understanding of marketing attribution by becoming familiar with a few key terms: Touchpoint: Any interaction between your company and a potential customer. For example, this could be opening a marketing email or clicking on a Facebook ad. Conversion: Any action taken by a user that leads them through your marketing funnel. This ranges from capturing a lead - for example, by getting someone to sign up for a newsletter or free trial - to closing a sale. Credit: The value assigned to a particular touchpoint based on its role in generating the conversion. In some attribution models, all touchpoints that a customer encounters are assigned equal credit. In other models, touchpoints that are thought to play a greater role are given more credit. Together, these three elements form the basis of attribution marketing. Benefits of marketing attribution There are a few key reasons marketing attribution is critical for your business. Here’s how it can help bolster your marketing strategies: Strengthening your creatives: When you learn which campaigns can be attributed to user conversions, you’ll also understand which creatives work better than others. This way, you can adapt your creatives accordingly - whether it’s altering the messaging, adjusting the colors or changing your CTA. Optimizing your marketing spend: Relatedly, marketing attribution provides insights into which campaigns to spend your money on. Based on that data, you can allot more of your budget to the strategies that generate the most leads or sales. Improving the targeting strategy: Attribution models don’t just tell you which campaigns are high converting; they also give you insights into which users are affected by those campaigns. This information is invaluable when it comes to segmenting your market, understanding your behavioral analytics and creating highly targeted content that resonates with your audience. Adapting to consumer needs: Tracking top sources of traffic helps you adjust your offering to cater to the needs of prospective customers. For example, if there’s an ad campaign for a new product feature that lect. Increasing your ROI: By allowing you to optimize your creatives, appropriately allocate your marketing spend and strategically target your audience, marketing attribution ultimately leads to increased marketing ROI. What is a marketing attribution model? A marketing attribution model measures and provides attribution data. Different types of models use different metrics to supply data about which touchpoints are most responsible for generating leads. These include: First-touch attribution Last-touch attribution Lead conversion touch attribution Linear attribution Time-decay attribution U-shaped attribution W-shaped attribution Full path attribution Custom or algorithmic attribution Types of marketing attribution models An effective attribution model accurately pinpoints which messages a consumer encountered on what channel, and what touchpoint had the greatest influence over their decision to convert. That said, these models aren’t one-size-fits-all. Companies vary in their preferences for which models best suit their organization, since it depends on their industry, target market and business goals. Let’s dive into the differences between the various types: 01. First-touch attribution First-touch attribution is known as a single source attribution model. As its name implies, a single source attribution allocates all credit for a customer’s visit to just one source. The assumption here is that a user’s decision to convert can be traced back to a single touchpoint - say, one particular email or ad. In a first-touch attribution model, all credit gets assigned to the very first touchpoint. In other words, if a user gets a Facebook ad, then a YouTube ad, and then a marketing email - and afterwards decides to sign up for a free trial - their conversion will be entirely attributed to that initial Facebook ad. 02. Last-touch attribution Last-touch attribution is also a single source model. Like the previous model, it gives all credit for conversion to just one touchpoint - regardless of how many other touchpoints a user might encounter. Unlike first-touch attribution, though, this model assumes that the final touchpoint is entirely responsible for generating the conversion. In the example of the user who saw three consecutive campaigns - a Facebook ad, followed by a YouTube ad and then a marketing email - the latter would receive all the credit. Both the Facebook and YouTube ads that the user encountered would not be considered factors in persuading them to sign up. 03. Lead conversion touch attribution Another type of single source attribution model, lead conversion touch attribution gives all the credit to whichever campaign generated the lead. Let’s say our particular user made the decision to sign up by clicking on the marketing email, arriving at the website and then entering their contact details. By this model, the reason for their conversion would be 100% attributed to the marketing email, since that’s what brought them to the page on which they entered their details. Other marketing efforts - in this case, the Facebook and YouTube ads - would not be taken into consideration. This is one of the most popular types of attribution models - and intuitively, it makes sense. However, like other types of single source models, it doesn’t factor in the other elements of the sales cycle that may have brought the user to the point of conversion. 04. Linear attribution There are various types of attribution models that are more complex, taking into account multiple touchpoints. These are called multi-touch attribution models, or MTAs, and they factor in all touchpoints preceding a user’s decision to convert. Linear attribution, while more complex than a single source model, is the simplest type of MTA. This is because it gives equal credit to all the touchpoints. By this model, that Facebook ad, YouTube ad and email marketing campaign are presumed to be equally responsible for persuading that particular user to sign up. 05. Time-decay attribution Another type of MTA model, time-decay attribution gives the majority of the credit to the touchpoints that a user was most recently exposed to. The idea here is that touchpoints that occurred closer to a user’s conversion may have been more impactful in their decision than touchpoints that happened prior. In our example, the email marketing campaign would receive the most credit. The YouTube ad - let’s say it was viewed a week before the email marketing campaign - would receive a moderate amount of credit. Meanwhile, the Facebook ad, if viewed a month before that, would receive a very small amount of credit. For lengthy sales cycles, such as those of many B2B companies, the touchpoints will be more spread out. For a large and substantial sale, for instance, the sales cycle could fall around 6 to 9 months. In this case, all touchpoints within these 6 to 9 months would be taken into account - with the most recent ones being presumed more responsible for driving the conversion. 06. U-shaped attribution At this point, you may have noticed that the difference between MTA models lies in which touchpoints they choose to prioritize over others. Linear attribution models give equal credit to all touchpoints. Time-decay MTAs give credit to campaigns based on how recently consumers interacted with them. The U-shaped model, also known as a position-based model, gives credit to two key touchpoints - the first and the last. It gives a smaller amount of credit to any touchpoints in between. Specifically, the first touch and the final touch (aptly called the lead creation touch) each receive 40% of the credit for the user’s conversion - making up a total of 80%. The remaining 20% is distributed among the middle touchpoints, giving a small percentage of the credit to each one. 07. W-shaped attribution Similar in principle to a U-shaped model, a W-shaped model is another type of position-based MTA. Like a U-shaped model, this model gives a large share of the credit to the first and last touches. The difference is that it also gives a large share of the credit to a third touch in the middle, known as opportunity creation. In this case, all three touchpoints - the first touch, the opportunity creation touch, and the lead creation touch - each receive 30% of the credit. Together, they’re responsible for 90% of the user’s decision to convert. The final 10% is divided between any remaining middle touchpoints. 08. Full path attribution This type of MTA has much in common with U-shaped and W-shaped attribution, but it distributes the bulk of the credit between four - rather than two or three - touchpoints. The additional touchpoint is the interaction that triggered the purchase. In this way, the full path model doesn’t just map out the factors generating leads; it also details the factors leading to the purchase. In other words, it takes into account the customer’s complete journey through the marketing funnel. 09. Custom or algorithmic attribution If you find that none of the models perfectly capture your strategy, you can always create a custom model. This is a more advanced approach that allows you to assign your own attribution weights to the touchpoints of your choice. To do this, you’ll need to have a deep knowledge of your marketing channels and the behavioral patterns of your buyers as they move through the sales funnel. If you’re just getting started with marketing attribution, this isn’t an ideal option to launch into, as it can consume a great deal of time and resources. For many companies, attribution tools that make use of the existing models are highly effective in creating a targeted and optimized marketing strategy. How to choose the right marketing attribution tool for your business There’s a wide range of platforms that make use of these various marketing attribution models. Like with other marketing tools, there’s no black-and-white answer when it comes to finding the best option for your business. However, there are some important points to consider when making your choice: Immediate objectives: What is the primary purpose of your campaigns? For example, you might prioritize spreading brand awareness over driving sales. Analyze the goals of your campaign, and think about which types of attribution model helps you best achieve these goals. Remember, you can always change your goals - and attribution model - as your company evolves. Length of sales cycle: How long is your typical sales cycle? It’s important that your model doesn’t leave out crucial phases of the process - especially if your sales cycle is several months long. Online versus offline marketing: Are most of your marketing assets online, or are some of them take the form of print ads or in-person events? Be sure to take into account the effects of your offline marketing efforts when analyzing your attribution data. Lifetime customer value: The most valuable customers don’t just convert once - they’re repeat buyers. Because of this, your attribution model should not only measure first-time conversions; it should also help you track and optimize further conversions by the same customers. How to get started with marketing attribution A convenient solution for getting started is Wix’s marketing attribution tool for Facebook ads. This option is available to users of Wix Stores, and it’s fully integrated with your professional website. To use this tool, go to your Wix dashboard and open a Facebook ad campaign. Once your ad is up and running, check the Facebook Ads dashboard for valuable campaign stats and analytics. This information is broken down into sections so that you can easily see how your ads are performing and whom they’re impacting. Here are some of the marketing attribution insights to pay attention to: Top Stats: This section displays the most important campaign statistics in one place, including your total reach, site visits and ad revenue . Purchase Funnel: Take a look at this section for insights into your customer journey, from the moment someone first viewed your ad to their completion of a purchase. Audiences: See demographic data about the people viewing and clicking on your ads, including their gender, age and location. Ad Engagement over Time: Check how your ad is performing over a specified period of time, and get data about views, clicks and site visits from your audience. Together, these key insights will not only enable you to optimize your Facebook ads; they’ll also help you make informed, data driven decisions about your marketing strategy moving forward.

As a small business owner, you know how important your online brand is to your business. A positive customer perception of your brand can lead to conversion, sales and bookings. But what do you do when a provocative comment makes its way to your website or social media feeds? Do you delete the comment? Argue back? Turn off comments altogether? Or block them? You’ve just been trolled—and you shouldn’t wait to see what will happen next, as it can lead to the internet becoming an unwelcoming and unsafe place. Thankfully Talya Adler, Wix’s online brand management expert, is here to help you develop a plan for dealing with online haters. Learn how to start a business and create a business website with Wix and grow your brand on a platform that protects against cyber threats—DDoS attacks and malware—and offers around-the-clock monitoring. Wix’s website security is fully managed by experts, so you can run your business with peace of mind. What are internet trolls? Before we dive in, let’s get on the same page about what we’re calling a troll. A “troll,” in internet slang, is someone who posts intentionally inflammatory and upsetting statements in online communities, such as social media, comments sections on a website, forums and chat rooms, to provoke unwary victims and delight in their anguish. They borrow their name from the original trolls of Scandinavian folklore. According to Jennifer Beckett, a lecturer in Media and Communications at the University of Melbourne, trolling is “a specific act: throwing bait into the internet water in the form of deliberately provocative statements (not personal attacks, that’s ‘flaming’) and waiting for someone to bite.” Why are there internet trolls (and what impact do they have)? Trolling exploded after the advent of the social internet. While the internet doesn’t create trolls, it does give people predisposed to aggressive and unpleasant behavior a place to amplify and make visible their hostility, found an Aarhus University study published in the American Political Science Review. One of the study’s authors, Alexander Bor, tweeted: “...The people hateful on Twitter offend others in face-to-face conversation too.” The researchers, who polled over 8,000 American and Danish people, also identified being a status seeker as another strong characteristic among trolls. Businesses are often plagued with trolls on their social media feeds. For example, in 2019, Coconut-water brand Vita Coco playfully threatened to send urine to a man who trolled them on Twitter for their product's divisive taste. Vita Coco “won” the battle, according to the critic Tony Posnanski. And what started as individuals annoying people and businesses on the internet has turned into a strategic form of digital warfare over the past decade. Coordinated troll armies have played a large role in high-profile harassment cases, ranging from 2014's Gamergate, the 2016 American presidential election, and 2022's Johnny Depp v Amber Heard trial. The Philippines even has a government-sponsored troll army. How to deal with internet trolls While you hopefully never have to deal with a troll problem, it's a small business myth that there's nothing you can do about it. There is a strategic response that can help minimize how it affects your business. In the words of Wix: “Don’t panic. Don’t answer impulsively. Don’t apologize.” While every internet troll case is unique, this workflow can help you figure out your next steps: Reread Research Respond 01. Reread Online communication comes without body language, facial expressions and a tone of voice. Make sure you fully understand what is being said to avoid any misinterpretation. It may be helpful to ask someone else to read the content for a gut check before moving forward. It’s good to check the timing of the posts—especially for small and medium-sized businesses. Perhaps you’re launching a new product/service or hosting a conference. While these seem like normal processes in business, they could become an open call for status-seeking trolls to attack your brand. For example if you’re streaming a live event, you’ll want to monitor in real time the comments coming in. An internet troll could also be fishing you into a spat about a topic far bigger than your business alone, whether it’s for political, cultural or religious reasons. Adler recommends avoiding these types of engagement altogether. Inform yourself about what’s going on in the world and be in tune with discourses taking place around you. “You don’t want to become the next internet meme,” says Adler. 02. Research After rereading the content, investigate the account and their history. You may find that your internet troll’s account has roped in other customer care accounts into online battles. If that’s the case, Adler says to keep your distance and don’t feed the troll. You could also discover that it’s a bot that simply needs to be blocked and reported. However, if a cursory check seems like there’s more to the story, use social network analysis to investigate further into the internet troll. Search their social media accounts to find how big their following is and how extensive it goes across platforms. Are they getting shared or retweeted? Do their posts get commented on and by who? Your next step will depend on how “influential” your troll is and how much damage they can bring to your business. Mega-influencers. These are celebrities with hundreds of millions of followers across the biggest platforms. Macro-influencers. These are influencers that have garnered between 100,000 and 1 million followers. Micro-influencers. These are influencers with a following between 1,000 and 100,000 people. Despite their size, Adler says, these micro influencers are among the most engaged with their audience. Thus their potential impact is higher than a macro-influencer, she adds. Nano-influencers. These are influencers who have fewer than 1,000 followers, but are highly trusted by their audience. Non-influencers. These are regular people who have fewer than 1,000 followers, but don’t have any regular engagement or trust built with their audience. 03. Respond If you’re dealing with a legitimate customer, Adler recommends taking the conversation privately. Ask them for additional information (proof like screenshots) to better understand their case. You’ll want to better understand their grievances in order to solve their issues. If you’re dealing with an influencer trolling you, it may make sense to consult with a PR or brand expert to help you get your response messaging right. And if your business is being accused of misdealings, you may need to go on the defensive. Depending on the severity of the case, you might want to bring in a lawyer to sue. Preventing trolls in the first place At the center of troll prevention is a thorough content moderation strategy. While you could hire someone to monitor content and delete comments as they arise, you can also just choose a website platform that lets you manage which site visitors can comment on your posts in the first place.

There are a lot of ways businesses and teams measure success. You can take a look at your profits month over month, or examine how your business has grown over a set period of time. However, if you want to get a well-rounded overview of how your company is performing in specific areas, then you need to look at KPIs. KPIs, or key performance indicators, can be used by any type of business, from self-employed freelancers to small business owners and companies with dozens of employees. There are many different types of KPIs that can be used across multiple departments and teams. For example, you might create a website and then measure the success of clicks or conversions using KPIs. Alternatively, your HR team can apply them to your onboarding process to see how many employees you’re retaining. Since there are dozens of different KPIs out there, it can be tough to know which ones to focus on if you’re just getting started. Here, we’ve gathered some of the most important KPI examples that you can use for your business. What are KPIs? A key performance indicator is a metric that measures the performance of a business, team, individual, or project. They’re one of the main ways of assessing whether or not you’re meeting your goals or target objectives. KPIs need to be measurable so that you can monitor change over time. In addition, they need to have a distinct goal as well as a clear source of data that can be relied upon for important decisions. This data needs to be looked at often so that you can continuously track your KPIs to see how close you are to your goals. While there are hundreds of different KPIs out there, there’s no need to implement all of them for your business. When looking at the overall performance of your business, stick with around five different KPIs to measure your progress (see business strategy examples to learn more). Then, you can also track more specific KPIs for each department, such as marketing, sales, HR, customer service and development. This will help each department work together towards a more clearly defined goal, while still working towards the overall company targets. KPI examples and definitions These are some of the most common KPIs broken down into industry or department. If you’re starting a business, understanding the types of KPIs available to you is crucial for assessing future success (see business strategy examples). You might want to use a few of them for each one of your teams, or just select a few important KPIs for your entire business. Sales KPI examples 01. Total Sales Volume: Measures the total volume, in dollars, of sales each month. Create a monthly or quarterly target so that your sales team has a goal, and be sure to adjust it regularly for dips or increases in sales which might occur around seasonal events or holidays. 02. Sales Cycle Length: Taking too long to complete a sale can negatively impact your bottom line and prevent you from reaching your quarterly goals. This KPI helps you measure how long it takes for a sale to be completed from start to finish. 03. Sales By [Metric]: You can break down where your sales are coming from by different metrics, such as region, age, sex, demographic, interests, etc. This helps you see which clients are bringing in the most revenue and which are underperforming. 04. Sales Cost to Volume Ratio: Making a sale is almost never free. A good chunk of your budget is probably going into each sale, with costs like salary or commissions, marketing costs, etc. That’s why it’s important to measure your sales expenditures vs. what your sales team is generating. This will help you see if your sales team is operating efficiently or not. Financial KPI examples 05. Revenue: In and of itself, revenue isn’t a KPI, but depending on your business, there are a few ways to measure this in terms of performance. Calculating your profit minus your costs is one of the main ways companies determine if they’re generating revenue. You should be measuring this KPI regularly by year, quarter and by month. Create a yearly revenue plan where you map out your expectations, then track your revenue over each quarter and month. Next, compare it to your yearly plan to see if you’re meeting your goals or if your initial yearly plan needs to be adjusted to meet more realistic expectations. 06. Free Cash Flow: This metric measures how much you can generate compared to your company’s operation costs. In order to calculate your free cash flow, you need to subtract your capital expenditures from your operating cash flow. This KPI is often used by investors to see if a business is profitable or not. 07. Gross Profit Margin: Get a percentage value of your total sales revenue. This KPI doesn’t look at expenses, but instead focuses mainly on profits. It’s a good yardstick to use when comparing your profits to that of your competitors. 08. Net Profit Margin: This KPI looks at the total percentage of your revenue after you deduct all your expenses, like operating costs, taxes and interest. Net Profit Margin is more helpful for internal comparison of your profits. Marketing KPI examples 09. Traffic: This is a pretty common KPI example. Here, you’re looking at the total number of visitors to your business, whether it’s traffic to your website or visitors in a physical location. You can measure the differences of this KPI over any amount of time, such as by hour of the day, day of the week, or month after month to see when you’re getting the most visitors. 10. Cost Per Lead: Once your traffic is converting into leads, you’ll probably want to know what each lead is costing. You might look at your cost of bringing in traffic or running your campaigns. This is a common KPI in online marketing and it usually measures how many people express interest in your business vs how many people see your ad or campaign. Many popular web analytics tools will allow you to set up this KPI to easily keep track of your progress. 11. Cost Per Phone Call: Sometimes the goal of your advertising campaign is to bring in calls. Calls can either directly be the source of sales or, if not, can be the start of a relationship between a potential customer and a business. When someone calls a business, they are likely very interested in what they have to offer, making cost per phone call a good metric. The complication, however, is that it may be difficult to track which advertisement brought in the call. Consider using a call tracking service to help you determine whether your ad spend was worthwhile. 12. Conversion Rate: A conversion rate takes things a step further than the cost per lead. This KPI measures how many conversions, or sales, you get compared to traffic. For example, if your website sees 1,000 visitors a month and you make 50 sales, your conversion rate is 5%. 13. Time on Site: This is one of those KPI examples that often stumps marketers since it can be tricky to optimize. You want to see how much time visitors are spending on your site before exiting or converting. If they’re leaving your site after only a few seconds, it’s likely that something is wrong with your website performance, usability, relevance, or content. Customer KPI examples 14. Customer Lifetime Value: Customer relationships are important, but it’s necessary to know how much value each client brings to your business. Customer lifetime value calculates how much monetary value you get from a client’s entire history with your company. To calculate this, you need to look at metrics like total purchase values and the number of purchases over time. 15. Customer Acquisition Cost: If you want to measure the effectiveness of your marketing, you need to look at how many clients it’s bringing you and whether it fits into the cost of your campaign. To arrive at this KPI, divide the total number of new clients you have by your acquisition expenditures. 16. Abandon Rate: This is an important metric for a customer support team since it can help you mitigate the number of unsatisfied clients. If clients are calling or chatting and then hanging up or getting disconnected before speaking to a representative, it’s important to understand why. Is your wait time too long? Did they find answers elsewhere? Abandon rates will help you understand your clients better and also optimize your customer support resources. 17: First Contact Resolution: Another important KPI for your customer support team is the rate of first contact resolution. Measure the number of clients who need to reach out to customer support multiple times for the same issue. This will help you understand where your team needs extra training to learn to resolve issues quicker, or where your process needs to be improved to avoid repeat contacts for the same issue. HR KPI examples 18. Employee Turnover Rate: The overall success of your business depends heavily on your employees, so it’s crucial to know how often your team is changing. Calculate the number of employees who have left in a period of time by your total employees. A high rate might mean it’s time to reexamine your onboarding process, employee expectations, or company culture. 19. Revenue Per Employee: This is another common KPI that helps measure efficiency. You want to see how profitable each employee is, so start by calculating your total revenue by your total number of employees. Many investors will ask for this KPI as well since it’s a good indicator of how a company manages costs. 20. Employee Satisfaction: Send out regular surveys or quizzes to understand how satisfied your employees are with your company and their jobs. This can be a challenging KPI to measure accurately, but it will help the health of your business by showing you which employees or teams need attention before they’re unhappy enough to quit and leave you with gaps in your operation. 21. Training Costs: You should be looking at how much you’re investing in each employee’s training. New hires will usually cost more, but there’s also the cost of ongoing training and education. A high rate of training costs isn’t always a bad thing. Investing in your employees can often lead to higher employee satisfaction and more productive workers. Tips for choosing the right KPIs for your business While it’s important to be aware of the many KPI examples, it’s even more important to assess which KPIs will help your business succeed. Not all KPIs will be relevant to every type of business, so take your industry, goal, and your company’s needs into consideration. For starters, ask yourself what you’re trying to achieve with your business. You can break this down by year or quarter to focus on different aspects of your company and use different KPIs. Maybe one quarter you want to pay closer attention to generating more leads, in which case you’d use more marketing KPIs, and then the following quarter you want to turn those leads into sales. Your KPIs should follow your general goals, not the other way around. Here are a few things to keep in mind to help you select the right KPIs to use for your business: Make sure your KPIs directly relate to your goal. If your goal is to boost sales, look at things like site traffic and conversion rates. Focus on a few key metrics. Instead of measuring anything that can be measured just for the sake of it, focus on a handful of KPIs at a time. Only once they’re optimized, move on to a different set of KPIs. Consider what stage your company is in. Are you just starting out? Going to market? Rebranding? Each stage will have a different set of goals and metrics to measure. Stay away from vanity metrics. Some KPIs help your business look good, but don’t really mean much in terms of reaching your goals. Metrics like “likes,” views, or clicks might seem impressive, but don’t mean much in terms of whether or not you’re moving closer to your goal. Choose KPIs that help you move your business forward over ones that only look good on paper. Look at your competitors. There’s nothing wrong with borrowing a set of KPIs from your competitors. If you have a similar business model, products, or services, it can be really helpful to know how you’re performing comparatively.

You can be a seasoned company with an established business plan, or be starting out and create a website for your new venture. Either way, identifying and understanding your competitors at each step of the process can lead to building a better business strategy. This is where a SWOT analysis comes into play. It is a useful tool for making improvements and keeping your marketing goals on track. In this guide, we’ll explain what this method is all about and how to do a SWOT analysis of your own. What is a SWOT analysis? SWOT is an acronym for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. A SWOT analysis is a strategy used by businesses for measuring and evaluating their overall performance, and that of competitors, in an objective manner. All these factors help business owners make smarter decisions for their company, such as if a venture should grow into a new field or rebrand itself. The first two parameters, strengths and weaknesses, involve internal factors such as your reputation, team, location and intellectual property. These considerations are not necessarily permanent, and can fluctuate over time. It’s within an organization's own control to keep or change them (which can happen for the better or the worse). So, assuming you want to make a positive change, you’re going to need to put forth the effort and time to see that happen. Opportunities and threats are related to external influences such as competitors, market trends, and prices of materials. Unfortunately, these are not within an organization’s control, and therefore you are not able to change them. That said, successful businesses and corporations learn how to work with these factors to their advantage, and also adapt their strategies accordingly in order to compete with others in the field. Why do a SWOT analysis As mentioned earlier, SWOT analysis is a lengthy process that can help different types of businesses draw conclusions by enabling them to see the bigger picture clearly. Once they have obtained valuable data and insight, only then can businesses formulate a clever and strategic plan accordingly. Furthermore, a SWOT analysis forces you to examine your business in new and interesting ways vis-à-vis your strengths and weaknesses. This preparedness enables you to not only be ready for any challenges that might impact your business, but also offers a deeper understanding of potential opportunities or threats within your target market. How to do a SWOT analysis SWOT analysis should be a collaborative and inclusive process, so before you can really dive in, be sure to assemble your partners, stakeholders and any other decision-makers who will bring their ideas to the table. This way you’ll ensure you hear multiple opinions and diverse outlooks that’ll enrich your overall SWOT discussion ahead. Below, we’ll walk through the stages of how to do a SWOT analysis for reviewing both your own company and competitors. For each one, grab a white board, sheet of paper, or another note-taking device. On this, create four sections for each company you’ll analyze. Label the sections with these parts: strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. And remember that when it comes to this type of analysis, leave out the bias. The more honest you are, the better and more useful your results will be. Steps on how to do a SWOT analysis: In order to get a better sense of what a complete SWOT analysis might look like, we’ve taken the example of a hypothetical massage therapist who is starting a service business. Identify your company strengths Be aware of your weaknesses Recognize business opportunities Understand potential threats Make a business plan 01. Identify your strengths Strengths are the big things that a particular company is doing well, which gives them a competitive advantage in their industry and benefits their customers. For your own business, identifying your strengths can help you leverage these by making them stronger. For competitors, consider their strengths a goal to aim for. Ask yourself, How can I do what they do, but better? or, How can I create my own twist on this idea that outsmarts theirs? Here are a few questions to consider as you begin your SWOT analysis: What are this company’s competitive advantages in the industry? What features do they offer that are unique and valuable? What processes are they excelling in? What draws customers in? Are they a market leader? If so, how did they get here? Is the organization expanding and hiring new employees? What strong assets does the company have, i.e., intellectual property, stakeholders, buildings, etc.? 02. Be aware of your weaknesses These are the aspects of an organization that could use some improvement. During this stage of a SWOT analysis, it’s especially important to be honest with yourself. It might be a bit uncomfortable at first, but if you don’t draw attention to a weakness, there won’t be room for you to make it better. Note that many of the points you analyzed from the strengths above can be addressed in this section as well, but with a reverse meaning. For example, a strength might be “expanding their business and hiring new people,” while a weakness could be “losing employees to competition.” So think about those as options in addition to these kinds of questions: What could this company do better? What processes could be improved? Is this company lacking an established reputation? What is this company struggling with compared to others in the industry? What do customers often complain about? Is the organization losing employees? What assets is the company lacking, from patents to funding to employee positions and more? 03. Recognize business opportunities Owning a business is all about seizing the moment. Opportunities are probably the same for yourself and your competition, if not very similar. Recognizing them is the first step, and taking advantage of them before your competition does is the second. Likewise, you should do so at the determined time that makes the most sense for your business, depending on what stage of development you’re in. Here are more questions for doing a SWOT analysis the right way: What is the latest trend, such as a green initiative to use recycled packaging or working with social media influencers for promotion? What are some upcoming events to take advantage of, such as a trade show, holiday or recent news release? Is there a loophole in your market, such as a cheaper supplier or opportunity to eliminate the middleman? Is there an opportunity to expand to a larger building or better location? Could the business be sold soon? Or on the other hand, could this business buy smaller, local businesses to expand? 04. Understand potential threats These are external factors which can put a business in a negative light. And just like opportunities, threats are often similar for both you and your competitors. However, some threats can be individual to an organization, such as a particularly bad PR scandal from an unhappy customer. It’s extremely important to learn how to mitigate these, and prevent them from turning into larger issues in the future. Although threats come last in the SWOT analysis, it might be a good idea to address them first off paper. Like a small fire, if you don’t act quickly, threats can sometimes cause irreplaceable damage. Here are examples of potential threats: Is a customer expressly unhappy with a particular product or service? Is the market fluctuating, i.e., are prices rising, are consumers purchasing alternatives, etc.? Are there new government regulations to watch out for? What is it that they are doing better? Do some market research to find out. Will new technology become available in the near future that could make this business’s products or services obsolete? Are consumers no longer expressing interest in these services? 05. Make a business plan Now that you’ve laid out the most important components affecting the success of your organization and your competition, you have the tools you need to develop a strategy. This plan will guide you to make improvements in your company, and compete on a level playground with your competition. Consider these five steps in working through your plan: Get feedback on your own SWOT analysis from your employees and other relevant stakeholders. Draw out a plan, which involves using your strengths to counteract your weaknesses, as well as finding opportunities through your threats. If you’re just starting a business, write out these components as a part of your business plan, too. Communicate your ideas to your team members, making sure that everyone is on board and held accountable. Prioritize your action items, starting with the most important factors first. (Perhaps these are your threats if they are urgent matters.) Execute your plan with a business proposal. Introduce the plan in the format of listed action items for your team, making sure to assign a designated person for each topic. As your business continues to grow and evolve, know that this is just a snapshot of a moment in time. Many of these factors are subject to change at a later date. It’s a good idea to come back to this exercise in the future so that you can properly assess where your business stands in your industry and how far along you came.

If you’re anything like me, spending even a few minutes away from your cellphone can feel like you’re missing a limb. With almost 2 billion smart-phone owners worldwide, a strong web presence no longer means having a great looking website alone, but one that functions as well on smaller screens as it does on your desktop. With mobile internet browsing about to surpass time spent on desktop view, smart business owners know that they need to make their website’s mobile view a strong priority. If you’ve got a Wix website, you’re already one step ahead of the game! Thanks to the Wix Mobile Editor, you’ll be able to customize all of the important aspects of your website to ensure that it looks and runs smoothly both on handheld devices and on desktops. Alternatively, you could even transform your website into a mobile app for an even smoother user experience. Here are the steps that you need to take to ensure that your website looks great no matter what type of screen you view it on. Consider the Mobile Mindset Looking to create one of the best mobile websites out there? The first thing to consider is user experience. While you may be building your website with the help of a mouse or trackpad, keep in mind that a large portion of your audience will likely be accessing your pages from a smaller touchscreen. Thankfully, the tech geeks at Wix have taken this into consideration when building the Mobile Editor. By adjusting your Editor’s view to a smaller screen size, complete with a true to scale mobile boarder parameters, the Mobile Editor gives you an accurate idea of what your site will look like in the palm of your site viewer’s hands. When considering responsive vs adaptive design debate, this adaptive solution is a great option for beginners. Mobile-Friendly Menus Your header menu may look great on your desktop site, but shrunk down, that same menu may be hard to grasp onto on-the-go. To make moving along your site easier on a touch screen, the navigation menu on the mobile version of your Wix site has been changed to a more thumb-friendly drop-down menu. Traditional navigation menus aren’t your only option, especially when you’ve got your mobile view in mind. One of the biggest trends in web design right now is using hamburger menus. Another option is to base your page menu on an image grid. The focus on large icons and dramatic buttons look great across all platforms and make moving along both your mobile & desktop pages a breeze. Check out this Tour Operator template, as well as these additional mobile templates, for some inspiration. Smartphone, Smarter Shopping: A new statistic shows that about 42% of smartphone owners compare item prices on their mobiles while they’re shopping in store. All that information at the tip of your customer’s fingers, means that if your business has a physical location, updating your website often with current pricing and promotions has never been more important. With mobile phones tagging along on shopping trips, you also might want to consider giving your customers a little extra love from your mobile marketing. Consider offering coupons via a QR code that can be easily redeemed right from your customer’s smartphone. You can also offer special email offers on-the-go thanks to Wix's great looking mobile viewing capabilities. eCommerce Business owners are not exempt from investing in mobile-first design. Purchases made by tablets and smartphones are consistently on the rise, meaning that the mobile version of your online store needs to rock! Make sure that all of the important information needed to sink your sale like strong call to action buttons, payment methods and contact forms look crystal clear and are easy to access on the mobile version of your site. Smart Social: Whether you like it or not, odds are that your customers already have their smartphone in the palm of their hands by the time they walk into your business. Take advantage of that mobile access by offering special discounts to customers who help promote your business online. Get your business noticed by giving your fans an incentive to check-in to your location on Foursquare or offer a special discount when they give you a review from Yelp. If your clients are known to take pictures of your great looking goods, let them know that you’ll be happy to share their pics on Instagram. Take advantage of those great looking photos by syncing your Instagram feed onto your website. The constant flow of new image content will look great both on mobile and on your desktop by way of this fully integrated social feed. Learn more about turning your website into an app for even greater functionality.

The most seasoned entrepreneurs know that running a business is a marathon, not a sprint. In order for your business to last the race, you must invest in a strong foundation and good habits. Throughout this guide, we'll explore a variety of tips and strategies to help you navigate the challenges that come with starting and running a business, such as creating an effective business website, securing financing and managing your team. By implementing these suggestions and staying committed to your vision, you'll be better prepared to overcome obstacles and succeed in the long run as a small business owner. How to run a business: 10 tips for success Turn your ideas into action Create your business plan Consider an exit strategy Set your budget Choose a bookkeeper or accounting software Secure financing for your business Effectively hire and manage employees Develop a strong marketing strategy Scrutinize the customer experience Invest in yourself and team 01. Turn your ideas into action Every business is born from an idea, but not all ideas have the same potential. Some ideas may be too risky. While others may be too shortsighted. That’s why one of the first steps in learning how to start a business is learning how to separate the wheat from the chaff. Start by looking for inspiration in areas that are familiar to you: Personal interests or passions: Transforming your passions into a business allows you to leverage your enthusiasm and expertise in a niche market. By focusing on areas that genuinely interest you, you're more likely to remain motivated and connect with your audience. Professional experience: It goes without saying that drawing from your past work experiences or industry knowledge can give you a leg up in understanding your niche wants and/or developing a unique product or service. Start with what you know before branching out into other areas. Trend and competitor analysis: Keep an eye on emerging trends and look for opportunities to position yourself at the forefront of change. This can help you to capture early adopters' interests and gain a competitive edge. Consumer research: Take the time to talk with experts in your industry, plus the people that you’re looking to serve. Get their feedback on your idea, and use it to refine your vision. 02. Create your business plan Once you’ve identified a promising business idea, a business plan can help you clearly define your long-term goals and gameplan. You should be able to reference this doc to keep your team on track, as well as explain your vision to potential investors. A solid business plan consists of these sections: Executive summary: A concise, persuasive overview of the business plan that enables readers (such as investors or potential partners) to quickly grasp the essence of your venture. Company description: An outline of your business's background, including your mission, vision, early achievements, unique strengths and competitive advantage. Products and services: A detailed explanation of your offerings, proof of concept, visuals and pricing plans—with the goal of showcasing your unique selling points and the value you bring to the market. Market analysis: Research on your industry, competitors, barriers to entry, target market and your business's position within the market. Marketing and operations plans: Details on how you plan to reach your audience via branding, advertising, promotional activities and fulfillment strategies. Management and organization: A description of your venture's legal structure, key personnel and other stakeholders. Financial projections: An estimate of initial investment, funding needs, profit timelines and financial management practices. (These projections help you to evaluate your venture's financial health and long-term potential.) 03. Consider an exit strategy Do you ultimately dream of selling your business, merging it with another company or passing it on to a successor? While it may seem counterintuitive to think about your exit strategy before your business has even taken off, envisioning your endgame can help you make more strategic decisions. An exit strategy also forces you to anticipate market changes, industry trends or personal circumstances that may impact your exit from the business. It additionally plays a crucial role in attracting investors or potential buyers by demonstrating a clear plan for delivering returns on their investment. Keep in mind that an exit strategy doesn’t mean you necessarily have to go through with it. Think of it as a contingency plan—by having a planned exit, you can reduce potential losses if unexpected challenges arise or if the business doesn't perform as expected. 04. Set your budget It’s always helpful to create a detailed budget that factors in your startup costs, ongoing operational expenses, marketing costs and more. To accurately assess how much money you’ll need to run your business, you’ll need to know your break-even point as well—that is, the point at which your business's total revenues equal its total expenses, indicating that you have neither made a profit nor incurred a loss. Knowing this figure gives you a baseline for understanding how many products or services you need to sell to cover your bare minimum expenses. Once you’ve calculated your break-even point, you can: Set the minimum sales volume needed to cover your costs Evaluate the profitability of your offerings and create pricing plans Identify opportunities for cost reduction Assess how feasible your business model is 05. Choose a bookkeeper or accounting software If accounting isn’t your forte, then it’s especially important to invest in a bookkeeper or accounting software from the get-go. Both can help you keep accurate records, comply with legal requirements and analyze your finances properly. Accounting software can serve as highly convenient plug-and-play solutions, helping to automate routine tasks like invoicing and payment reminders. However, you’ll need some basic bookkeeping knowledge to get the most out of these types of software. So, if you’re not sure where to start, it might be better to hire a part-time bookkeeper. Did you know: Wix offers integrations with popular accounting apps, as well as powerful reports and analytics to keep your finances organized. Bookkeepers can offer their expertise in financial record-keeping and accounting principles. They can streamline workflows and advise you on ways to better manage payroll services (among other things), ultimately providing personalized attention. Submitting the wrong tax records can cause all sorts of problems, so it’s best to get this right first time by someone who knows what they’re doing. 06. Secure financing for your business When it comes to financing your new business, there are several options worth considering: Personal savings or contributions from family and friends. This allows you to retain full ownership and control over your business. Traditional bank loans or lines of credit, but these typically require a strong credit history and collateral. Small business grants or government programs that offer financial assistance to startups meeting specific criteria. Crowdfunding platforms that let you raise capital from a large pool of individual contributors who are excited about your idea. Venture capitalists or investors who are willing to provide funding in exchange for equity or a share of future profits. These financing options can help to stabilize your operations or nurture business growth, helping you afford new locations, equipment or product lines. They can additionally assist with cash flow management. No matter how big or old your business may be, you may face fluctuations in revenue that can impact your ability to cover expenses, payroll and investments. By securing extra capital, you can manage your cash flow during challenging periods. Debt refinancing could also be a valuable strategy if you're looking to improve your business's financial situation. By consolidating existing loans or securing a new loan with more favorable terms, you can reduce your interest rates, lower monthly payments and free up cash for other essential business needs. Just make sure to carefully assess your financial health and have a clear plan in place to manage your debt responsibly. 07. Effectively hire and manage employees As American author and management consultant Jim Collins once said: “Great vision without great people is irrelevant.” Inviting the right individuals to join your team is a crucial step in bringing your vision to fruition. Let’s take a look at some aspects you should keep in mind when adding new members to your team. Define your needs: Before you start recruiting, identify the specific roles and skills that you need in your team—both now and in the long term. Map out the qualifications, skills and experience required to get the job done. Prioritize cultural fit: While skills and experience are essential, it's also crucial to find employees who fit your company culture. Look for candidates who share your values and work ethic. Strive to build a cohesive, collaborative environment where everyone feels comfortable and motivated to contribute their best work. Hire for potential: Don't overlook candidates who show potential for growth, aiming to develop a team that can grow and evolve alongside your business. Conduct regular performance reviews: Give your employees both scheduled and immediate feedback to help with their development. Use performance reviews to set clear expectations, offer constructive feedback and discuss growth opportunities. Invest in employee development: To attract and retain top talent, show that you're committed to your employees' growth and success. Offer ongoing training and development opportunities, plus encourage your team members to pursue their professional goals. Establish a clear and fair compensation system for employees: Creating a fair compensation system for employees, including salaries, hourly wages or commission structures, will help attract the right talent. Consider the types of additional benefits and incentives that matter to your staff beyond the essentials, such as health coverage and growth opportunities. By supporting your employees' well-being and achievements with a carefully crafted compensation strategy, you can nurture a driven and loyal team. Encourage flexibility and adaptability: During the growth phase, you might find yourself shorthanded and needing to wear different hats to keep up with demand. This flexibility extends to your team as well. As your business evolves, encourage your team to be open to embracing new roles, responsibilities and opportunities. 08. Develop a strong marketing strategy An effective marketing strategy outlines your approach to promoting your products or services to your target audience through both organic and paid means. As you look to formalize plans for reaching your target audience, make sure to take these essential steps: Analyze your competitors: Understanding the current market landscape helps you see if there’s a blue ocean of opportunities or a red ocean of established players. To conduct a thorough market analysis, identify your competitors. Make a list of your main competitors, both direct and indirect. Analyze their marketing strategies (see business strategy examples), strengths, weaknesses and customer base to identify gaps in the market. Perform a SWOT analysis: Gather feedback directly from your target audience through surveys or interviews. Talk to industry experts, study market reports and use other tools at your disposal to identify your business's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats within the market. Develop buyer personas: Buyer personas are semi-fictional representations of your ideal customers, based on both internal and external consumer research. Creating detailed buyer personas can help you to better define your target audience's needs, motivations and spending power so that you can properfly target your marketing campaigns. It’s helpful to revisit buyer personas, even if you’ve done it when you first launched your business. As your business evolves, your customers’ needs may also have evolved over time. Consider the Jobs To Be Done (JTBD) theory: As you think of the right way to introduce your product to buyers, heed Harvard Professor Theodore Levitt’s advice that “people don't want a quarter-inch drill. They want a quarter-inch hole.” In other words, focus on the benefits and results that your product helps to achieve—not just the product itself. What are customers actually looking to gain from your product or service, and how do you deliver on that? Choosing the right marketing channels: Avoid chasing every new and shiny marketing channel, and instead be selective of where you spend your time. Experiment with a manageable number of channels and content types, using clear KPIs and benchmarking your progress towards your goals. Create a professional website: One of the biggest small business challenges is building brand awareness, especially if you’re fighting for attention on crowded third-party platforms. For this reason, you’ll want to create a website that helps you stay in full control of your branding and the customer experience. 09. Scrutinize the customer experience Needless to say that in order to win and retain customers, you must deliver a strong customer experience. But the customer experience is influenced by a variety of factors, including the website experience, the experience with your product or service, customer service and more. In that vein, you’ll want to map out and analyze the customer journey from start to finish. How are people discovering your brand? What do they feel on your site? Where are customers getting stuck, and what questions do they have pre- and post-purchase? One way to understand the customer journey is by implementing the right Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software to gather data on how customers engage with your business. With the right CRM data, you can: Personalize your communication: Use CRM software to tailor your messaging and interactions to individual customers to improve the overall experience. McKinsey reports that 78% of customers who received personalized communication are more likely to recommend a brand to friends and family, underscoring the importance of first impressions. Resolve issues proactively: CRM software can help you identify customer pain points and address them before they escalate. By resolving issues proactively, you can enhance customer satisfaction and reduce churn. Get ahead of any obstacles: Track customer touchpoints throughout their journey and identify areas for improvement. For example, if you sell products online, keep your eyes peeled for reasons why people may abandon their carts. Test different solutions to potential problems, and use your CRM to gain insight into their impact. Wix’s built-in CRM tools allow you to centrally manage customer orders, communications and other tasks. Test drive Wix for free. 10. Invest in yourself and team Understanding your target market and sorting out the finances is important for your business, but improving yourself is just as crucial for thriving in a competitive landscape. Beyond your business plan and marketing strategies, there are several ways you can continue to grow professionally so that you can better run your business. Fail fast, fail often: There’s a great little quote from Little Miss Sunshine from the grandpa to Olive, the granddaughter. In a moment of doubt about the beauty pageant, Olive tells her grandpa she’s scared of being a loser, to which he replies, “A real loser is someone who's so afraid of not winning he doesn't even try.” Mistakes and setbacks are inevitable in any business venture. Instead of avoiding them, embrace a culture of continuous learning—which, in turn, will foster innovation and resilience, preparing your business for long-term success. Stay informed about industry trends: Stay informed about changes in your market (such as the rise of AI tools for business), emerging technologies and evolving customer preferences. By staying ahead of the curve, you can seize new opportunities and continue to grow and adapt to shifting conditions. Set realistic goals: Setting realistic, achievable goals allows you to measure progress and build confidence as you accomplish each milestone. When you achieve a goal, take the time to celebrate your success. It’s especially important to celebrate with your team. A little acknowledgement and a “thank you” goes a long way in boosting morale. Invest in personal development: As a small business owner, it's important to invest in yourself. By focusing on personal growth, you'll become a more adaptable and effective leader. Plus, your dedication to learning will foster a culture of growth within your company, inspiring your employees to seek out new opportunities for improvement, which ultimately contributes to the overall success of your business. Surround yourself with a supportive network: A supportive network of peers, mentors and colleagues is invaluable. Surround yourself with individuals who believe in your vision and can offer constructive feedback, advice and encouragement. A strong support system can also help you maintain confidence through the ups and downs of your entrepreneurial journey.

So, you’ve succeeded in bringing visitors to your website - great! You’ve even managed to turn some of them into paying customers - even better. But how do you now keep your business blossoming? One tried-and-tested method is marketing automation. This technology automates a variety of marketing activities, so you can rest assured that your customers are receiving the attention they deserve. Not only will you provide them with a personalized experience, but your business will also reap the benefits. In fact, out of the 284 million site visitors we tested, we found that the ones who received an automated response were 42% more likely to make a purchase on that website. Whether you already run a fully functioning business or are in the process of finding a professional website builder to bring your vision to life, this guide to marketing automation will explain how this method can greatly benefit your business, and which features you’ll want to use: What is marketing automation? Marketing automation is a platform that enables the automation of marketing tasks across different online channels. Businesses can use it to target users at strategic points throughout their customer journey, sending them automated messages via email, live chat or other modes of communication. While this marketing tool can be implemented across many different channels and campaigns, from social media marketing to landing pages, it’s especially common in email marketing. For example, you can send an automated email to a customer that has just purchased tickets to an event of yours, or follow up with them after the event to ask for feedback. Likewise, you can send automated email drip campaigns to engage new subscribers and drive sales. Marketing automation software, such as a CRM, can be used to make processes within your business run more efficiently, as it reduces the amount of time spent on repetitive tasks. It also lets you provide customers with content that is more personalized and specific to their needs. In turn, this can help you nurture leads, convert website visitors into customers and maintain positive relationships with existing customers. Main uses for marketing automation Whether you own an online store or a fashion blog, your business can benefit from this technique. While the offering varies across platforms, the following marketing automation features are all part of Wix marketing tools: Online stores: Automatically email your customers after they’ve made a purchase, with anything from a receipt, to a thank you note and more. Additionally, if a site visitor has added an item to their cart, but not proceeded to purchase it, you can send them a friendly reminder. By customizing the design of your email and nailing the copy to fit your brand identity, you can build a positive relationship with the customer, without being too forceful. Bookings: If your website enables online scheduling, you can utilize marketing automation to check in on clients that haven’t attended a class or session in a while. This extra bit of personal attention will make them feel valued. And if you want to go a step further, why not treat them to something special once they’ve participated in a certain number of sessions? Events: Hosting a party, conference or concert? If you have an events website, you can win your guests over by sending them automated emails once they’ve purchased a ticket, RSVP’d to an event or been added to a waiting list. Forms: Online forms are a known method of generating new leads. Whether your form encourages visitors to subscribe to your newly started blog, or functions as the main feature of your landing page, make the most out of it using marketing automation. Once a visitor has submitted a form on your site, you can send them an automatic message, welcoming them to your business. Member’s area: Have a special area of your site dedicated to members only? Treat your most loyal customers as VIPs by sending them automated messages once they’ve signed up for the first time, or each time they log in. What’s more, you can set triggers to automatically create a task for yourself or your team members, reminding you to follow up with a phone call, for example. Invoices: When it comes to making purchases online, people like to know exactly how much they’re spending for each item. You can use an invoice generator to keep your customers up-to-date on the status of their payments. After adding relevant details about your business, you’ll be able to create a fully customized invoice that can be emailed to your clients directly. Best practices for marketing automation You may have your email automation strategy down to a tee, but when it comes to marketing automation, there are different aspects to take into account. Here are a few tips on perfecting your automations: Tailor each customer’s experience to make them feel like an individual. Make sure you’re contacting them in the right context to keep it personal. For example, consider sending a welcome email to a new subscriber, or a follow-up message to see how a client is feeling after a yoga class. Keep generating new leads. While marketing automation is great for nurturing existing leads, make sure you’re not abandoning your inbound lead generation strategy (or in other words, the marketing activities you use to promote your website and bring more eyes to it). This way, you’ll keep your options open and grow your leads, while simultaneously tending to the leads you’ve already attained. Define goals that are specific, realistic and measurable. Ask yourself what you set out to achieve through marketing automation. Do you want to increase sales by 20% within the next six months? Or utilize an email marketing campaign to improve customer retention by 10% this year? Once you’re clear on your goals, you’ll be able to check your progress, instead of aimlessly sending out content to leads and customers. Measure your progress by checking your automation statistics. Are people responding better to a certain type of message? Have you noticed specific leads who are more regularly engaged? Or any that haven’t opened your emails at all? Insights such as these can help you adapt your strategy accordingly, to make sure you’re targeting the right prospects and optimizing your efforts by keeping things fresh and relevant. How to access automations on Wix Any marketeer will tell you that having a top-notch website design is one thing, but if you really want to grow your business, you’ll have to do more than that. As well as making use of these Wix marketing integrations, here’s how you can access automations on Wix: Head over to your site’s dashboard. Click ‘Customer Management’ on the menu on the left-hand side. Click ‘Automations’ to reach the marketing automation page. Use one of the recommended templates or create your own automation. You’ll then be asked to set a trigger (the event that initiates the automatic response) and an action (the reaction, for example sending out an email or a live chat message, creating a task for yourself and so on). Once you’ve created your automation, you’re good to go. Remember to analyze the performance of your automations so that you can keep optimizing and successfully growing your business. Marketing Automation FAQ

Search engine marketing, or SEM, has become a crucial part of marketing. As we search online for answers to all kinds of questions and queries, it’s become increasingly important for brands to know how to position their webpages above those of their competitors. If you’re looking to start a business or get found online, the ideal starting point is to create a website. Once you’ve done that you can pursue various avenues for site promotion. Some of the most important tactics to consider are SEO and SEM. While both SEM and SEO have similar goals and seem the same on the surface, they’re actually quite different. Here, we’ll take a deep dive into search engine marketing and look at how it differs from SEO as well as all the different elements that go into it. If you're looking for more advertisement examples, check out our guide. SEM acronyms you should know Before we dive into the topic, we wanted to help make sure that our terminology is clear and understandable. Adding another acronym to your marketing lexicon can seem daunting, so here’s a refresher of a few acronyms you should know in order to get a good grasp on this topic: SEM - search engine marketing SEO - search engine optimization SERP - search engine results page PPC - pay-per-click ROI - return on investment CTR - click-through rate What is SEM? The basics Search engine marketing is the act of using paid ads to increase a webpage’s visibility on SERPs. SEM can also be used as more of an umbrella term that often encompasses other types of digital marketing strategies, such as PPC and SEO. In general though, when we talk about SEM, we’re referring to advertisements and SERP optimization strategies that are paid rather than organic. Since Google is the most popular search engine, a lot of marketers work with Google Ads to create paid ads, but there are some other platforms you can use as well, which we’ll cover below. When you search for a topic on a search engine like Google, you often see text or product ads at the top of the page that is related to your search terms, and then below that, the organic results which are webpages that match your query. The ads at the top are what advertisers pay for. These are the first results a user will see on their SERP, making it a good way for brands to get their products, ads, blog, or promotions in front of an audience. PPC ads help drive conversions by directing traffic from motivated users directly to your website or dedicated landing page, so using SEM is often a preferred way for businesses to advertise online. While you are spending more money on ad clicks as compared with a more organic method of gaining traffic, like SEO, marketers often see a high ROI when using this type of paid online advertising. SEO vs. SEM: What’s the difference? So, if SEM is all about placing ads at the top of a SERP, isn’t SEO the same thing? Well, not exactly. SEO focuses mainly on organic search results, in other words, getting to the top of a SERP without paying for a click. With SEO, websites rank well on search engines by being the most relevant webpage for the user’s query, without spending a penny on the placement. That being said, there’s no reason why you can’t use both SEM and SEO strategies together. In fact, you might get better results by using the two techniques side-by-side instead of focusing all your marketing efforts on only one avenue of traffic. 9 SEM components to get familiar with There are a lot of different parts that make up search engine marketing. In order to ensure that your SEM strategy is most optimized, it’s crucial to have a good understanding of each one. 01. Keyword research The first thing to familiarize yourself with when it comes to working with search engines, whether you’re focused on SEM or SEO, is getting used to keyword research. Keyword research is the process of discovering the terms that online searchers are using that are relevant to your product or business. A keyword isn’t necessarily just one word, but usually, a short phrase that a user would use as their search query. The purpose of keyword research is to discover terms that are related to your business and that users typically use when searching online. If you do your research well, you can match the terms that someone searches for with targeted campaigns and ads and in so doing, gain a better shot of your website appearing on their results page. There are a lot of different tools you can use to conduct keyword research. You can use free tools like Google Keyword Planner or Wordstream’s Keyword Tool, or opt for paid programs like Ahrefs or SEMRush. If you’re just starting out, play around with the free tools until you’re comfortable, and once you want more specific data, opt for a paid research tool. 02. PPC marketing Pay-per-click marketing is when an advertiser pays every time someone clicks on their ad. PPC marketing can cover a number of different advertising directions including some banner ads and, of course, search engine marketing. This type of marketing differs from more static advertising with which you might pay a flat rate for your ad to appear for a specific amount of time, regardless of how many people interact with it. However, PPC is a little more involved than just paying for clicks. If it were that straightforward, brands with higher budgets would dominate by simply dedicating more money to their ads. Instead, PPC platforms like Google Ads, subject ads to an auction where they are vetted before being displayed on a SERP. In this way, more advertisers have a chance of getting their product in front of an audience. 03. Ad structure Depending on the search engine advertising platform you are using, there might be slightly different rules regarding your ad structure. However, generally speaking, SEM ads are composed of headlines, which are bold and easily visible to the searcher, and descriptions which sit beneath the headlines and provide more detailed information. Ads also usually contain a URL to let the searcher understand more about where they will land when they click. There is usually a character limit to all ad components. It is therefore essential that you utilize the limited space allotted to you wisely. Choose actionable words that clearly describe your product or service. Make it clear to the searcher why they should choose your business over the competition. We suggest utilizing CTAs to help get searchers clicking on your ads. 04. Ad auction and set up The auction an ad goes through is an automated process that begins every time a user searches for a query on a search engine. Essentially, the search engine considers numerous factors regarding the available ads for each query, and decides which ads best answer the searcher’s needs. In an auction, the search engine will determine which ads get displayed on the SERP based on a few different factors. For example, Google will pick winners of ad auctions based on the ads’ relevance, maximum bid and what they refer to as an ad’s quality score, or in other words how relevant and clear your ad content is. These factors together determine the chances of your ads showing up on SERPs. In order for advertisers to participate in ad auctions, they have to set up a few parameters. We touch below on setting up your Google Ads account, but generally speaking here are the essentials for getting your ads up and running. First, provide a list of keywords that you would like to generally compete for. Then, you must provide at least one ad that matches those selected keywords as well as set a budget that you are willing to spend for clicks on these specific ads. When making these selections, refer back to your keyword research. You want to ensure that you’re spending your ad budget well and your ads participate in fruitful auctions. Choose keywords that your intended audience is actually searching for so that you don’t bid on clicks that are irrelevant to your brand. This way, searchers that end up clicking on your ads, will be relevant customers or leads for your business. 05. Quality score for ads Your ad’s quality score, or essentially how on target your ad is, is a crucial metric that can be the determining factor of how often your ad gets displayed to the right users. Google takes both quality score and bid into consideration when placing an ad, so even if your bid is significantly higher than your competitors’, if your ad isn’t well written and relevant to the searchers query it might not get displayed as often. This also impacts how much an advertiser ends up paying per click as the stronger their quality score, the lower their bid may need to be in order to rank. A quality score is a rank given out of 10, and of course, the higher your score the better. It is based on three main factors: the expected CTR of a given ad, the relevance of that ad to the query's intent, and landing page experience, or how relevant your landing page is when people click on your ad. Therefore, to improve your quality score, focus on using keywords that are relevant and specific to the page you’re linking to, writing ads that relate to those keywords, and providing informative and pertinent landing pages. To create landing pages that display information clearly and help drive visitors towards conversion, we suggest using a landing page builder. 06. Ad account structure When opening an account on a platform like Google Ads, you’ll need to invest time into setting up your campaigns so that they’re organized and strategized. With Google Ads you have the opportunity to build a structure that ensures that your ads are placed in a thoughtful manner and helps keep your strategy well organized. You can create campaigns that are centered around a certain goal or alternatively a geographic region of your customers. Within your campaigns you’ll be able to set up ad groups which can revolve around a certain theme or type of keyword that you would like to target. Finally, within each ad group sit multiple keywords that you are targeting, as well as ads. These ads will be in line with the goals and keywords selected for your campaign and ad group. You can write individualized ads per ad group, or you can create a general structure for your ad and then substitute in certain themes or keywords to fit the specific ad group in which they are located. In this way you can create targeted ad copy to match specific goals. We also suggest trying multiple ads within each ad group. This can help you match more than one keyword that is placed in that ad group, as well as enable you to test different ad variations. For example, if you own a shoe store, you might want to focus one campaign on winter boots, and then an entirely different one on sandals for summer. The keywords, landing pages, and text you would use for each would be very different. You may also be willing to bid more money on one than the other, making it wise to split these campaigns up. It might seem time-consuming, but by getting your ads organized, you’ll have an easier time managing them. 07. Targeted ads A good strategy when it comes to creating relevant ads is to target them based on the audience you’re trying to reach. If we continue with the shoe store example, it is likely more lucrative to advertise stiletto heels to women than men, so when setting up your ad campaign, you can opt to not show that specific ad to men in order to make the most of your ad budget. There are a number of ways you can target your ads so that they’re seen by the right people, such as: By age: set age ranges to show your ad only to a certain age group. By gender: opt to display your ad only to men or women. By location: if you have a promo in a specific location, you can set your ad to be displayed to people in the same region only. By device: your product might only be relevant to a certain device, like a mobile app download, so set ads to be displayed to users browsing on specific devices. By schedule: set ads to only be displayed between certain hours so you don’t waste ad clicks during hours when you’re not available or the ad isn’t relevant. At first, you might think that you want your ads to be visible to as many people as possible, but the more constraints and targets you set on each ad, the more relevant they’ll become to the users who actually see them, in turn giving you a better ROI. 08. SEM platforms We already mentioned Google a few times here as a popular SEM platform, but there are others you can consider using as well. Here are some of the main SEM platforms you can use: Google Ads: as the largest search engine, it’s a no-brainer that running ads on Google will put you in front of the widest audience and generate a good ROI. Microsoft Advertising: formerly known as Bing Ads, Microsoft Advertising is Google’s main runner-up, and it’s worth investing time and budget into this platform alongside your Google ads. Verizon Media Native: what used to be Yahoo! Gemini, Verizon Media Native is now Yahoo!’s PPC platform and is a great alternative to Microsoft Advertising if you’re looking for a secondary SEM platform aside from Google. 09. Campaign and ad optimization Even after you’ve started to run your ads, you should be constantly monitoring and updating them. Take a look at your campaigns regularly to see how they’re performing and adjust your ad spend, keywords or ad copy accordingly. After some time, you’ll be able to see which keywords and ads are strong performers and which aren’t yielding the results you expected. The ones that are generating more clicks are the ones you should be paying more attention to, both because they’re gaining you more traffic and because you’re spending more on those ads. Once you’re comfortable analyzing your ad metrics and you can pinpoint where you’re succeeding, you can then set negative keywords. These are keywords you’re telling a search engine you don’t want to rank for because they’re irrelevant to your brand and eating up your ad spend budget. You can also narrow down your targets such as demographic or location once you get a better overview of who your audience is and where they’re coming from. How SEM is evolving While search engine marketing has allowed advertisers to create their own ads and optimize their campaigns as they see fit for years, they are now shifting towards a more automatic, AI marketing approach. For example, you can set Google Ads to only display your best performing ads, so you don’t waste your budget on ads that have lower ROIs. Google also provides the option for you to feed the system multiple ad headlines and descriptions and it will automatically combine them for the most ideal ad in any given auction. Another automated option is to give Google the landing page that you would like to lead searchers to, and allow Google to create the ad headlines for you. This is referred to as DSA, or Dynamic Search Ads. With this format, the search engine scans your pages, determines what they are discussing and then automatically creates related headlines to give searchers a true taste of what they are about to experience. These new options can free up time for search engine marketers and have the potential to shift the business going forward.

As someone who has chosen to create a website, you already know how crucial SEO is for your online success. By influencing how Google perceives and ranks your website in search results, you’re more likely to drive more traffic to your pages. It also helps to attract visitors with the right intention, meaning that they are actively looking for a business, product or service like yours. This results in higher chances of visitors converting. There are different levels of optimization techniques and features you can opt for when creating a website. For example, if you’re a business owner just starting out, you can take advantage of the Wix SEO checklist, which creates a personalized checklist of all the SEO elements you need to cover - on top of enabling instant indexing of your homepage by Google. However, if you’ve been in the game for longer, or simply want to take control of exactly how your pages are displayed in search results and on social networks, then keep reading. In an effort to continuously improve its offering and cater to professional users, Wix has several SEO tools designed to help you work more efficiently. From canonical URLs to structured data, let’s discover how to use these features to the fullest: How to use Wix SEO to optimize your site: Meta tags for social media share Structured data Canonical URL Image optimization Indexing 01. Meta tags for social media share You know the important role that social media plays in the success of your business. Ensuring that your brand remains consistent throughout all social channels is imperative to your image and reputation. So, where does this come into play? We’ve all experienced that moment when scrolling through Facebook only to see a shared link that looks a little ‘off’ - a cropped image or some automatically extracted text that makes no sense. It’s definitely not something you wish your followers (or potential clients) to see. With the Social Share panel in your Wix editor, you can control exactly how each page of your site looks, from the text to the image, when shared on the major social media platforms. Here are some helpful formatting guidelines: Image size: The recommended size is at least 1200 x 630 pixels. Title: The length should be 55-70 characters (including spaces). Description: The length should be 100 - 300 characters (again, including spaces). How to customize the social media meta tags of your Wix pages: 1. Open your Wix editor. 2. Click ‘Pages’ (on the left hand side of the editor). 3. Choose the page you wish to customize. 4. Select the ‘Social Share’ tab. 5. Upload an image and update the text that will show when your site is shared to any social network. 02. Structured data Adding structured data to your pages is highly advantageous for your website architecture and helps Google contextualize your content. For example, if you have a physical location, adding a schema markup on your contact page will help the bots understand that “123-456-789” is not just a series of numbers - it’s actually your phone number, and should be used to provide better and richer results to searchers. The same goes for your restaurant menu, postal address, opening hours, ratings and more. Structured data language was harmonized by Schema.org in 2011, which explains why we also refer to this as “schema markup”. Start using it as an excellent way to grab the attention of potential clients amongst an endless sea of competitors. How to add schema.org structured data to your Wix website: 1. Prepare your schema. You can generate the structured data using a tool like Schema Markup Generator. 2. Open your Wix editor. 4. On your panel, select the ‘Advanced SEO’ tab. 5. Under ‘Structured Data Markup’, select ‘Add New Markup’ and paste your schema in JSON-LD format. 6. After you’ve added your schema, use the ‘Validate Your Markup on Google’ button to check that there are no errors. Wix also validates the schema within the structured data field. It's important to note that you only get access to this tool if you have a Wix Premium Plan. 03. Canonical URL In the event that you create two pages that show identical or similar information you have to explain to Google which URL should be treated as the main version and therefore appear in search results. For example, if you write a blog article called, "Answering All Your Questions: What is SEO and how does it affect your ranking in 2019?" you will use the same keywords, structure and, for some parts, content as you did for your 2018 version. Although the original post is still valuable, you’ll want people to be directed to the newest one, every time they look for “web design trends” in their search engine. Implementing a canonical URL solves this issue. It’s important to note that Wix automatically adds a self-referential canonical tag to your site. Unless there is a good reason (like the example above) to change the canonical tag you should keep it as is. Additionally, you can customize your default canonical if you need to. 04. Image optimization Image optimization is an important part of optimizing your website’s performance. Good site performance is crucial for a great user experience on your site and anything that is good for the user is likely to improve your SEO as well. First of all, all images uploaded to your Wix site are optimized to fit the relevant screen, without sacrificing quality. Images can also be converted to WebP by Wix, which aids faster downloads. On top of this Wix websites use lazy loading and temporary placeholders - these make sure users get priority content first, while the rest of it loads. Along with automatic caching, which serves return users a saved version of your site and improves page load speed, by avoiding a long sever request, there are several ways in which your images are optimized for your sites performance. 05. Indexing Wix has a number of SEO features that help you control how your site is crawled and indexed by Google. The first is the auto create and submit sitemap feature - it creates and submits your site to Google, so it knows what to crawl. The editable robots.txt file allows you to choose which of your pages Google sees and crawls, and which it doesn’t. And, the Google Search Console integration gives you not only access to this popular Google tool and all of its data on your organic traffic, it also helps Google index your site or identify issues to fix that might be preventing your pages from being indexed. This is crucial to getting your business found on Google.

Climate catastrophes like droughts and increased hurricanes, wreak havoc on small business owners' finances. Yafa Cafe was just one of many New York restaurants that had to temporarily shut down their business after 2021’s Hurricane Ida. “[The flooding] was a hard stop on everything because we had just lost a bunch of our inventory,” says Hakim Sulaimani, the cafe owner and Wix user. While the Brooklyn cafe’s customer base and local community was able to raise $20,000 for the cafe in six hours after the hurricane, the “slow drip” of climate change—or the increased day-to-day costs that come from environmental changes — can hurt long-term financial outlooks just as much as the floods. For example, Yafa Cafe imports its main product, coffee beans, from Yemen which has been facing droughts for years. “Importing beans is already a process and from a war-torn country,” Sulaimani says. “But the supplies are low [due to droughts] and it makes it twice as difficult to create a space where this coffee is accessible to everyone. What happens is that coffee is sold at really expensive [prices], at least good coffee.” Sign up for The Wix Blog newsletter to get great reads plus helpful content about deciding to create a website and running your business in today’s online world— all delivered weekly to your inbox. A 2021 survey found that two-thirds of small to medium-size businesses worry they don’t have the right skills and knowledge to handle the impact of climate change in their industries. Even if they can recover from disaster, they’re not able to reach their own long-term sustainability goals due to a lack of skills and understanding (63%), funding (48%) and time (40%), the survey found. Initiatives like Climate Fit, a collaboration between several organizations like the United Nations and Oxford University, aim to bridge the skills gap. This hub brings practical tools and free online training courses (with 20 minute videos) to small and medium-size business owners. Topics include helping them secure green financing, promoting employee education and incorporating sustainable marketing into their strategy after they start a business. In terms of funding, many US businesses are seeking to build more sustainable operations. According to Bloomberg, sustainability-linked loans hit a 292% increase in May 2021 compared to all of 2020. There are current government grants—for example, the State of California has a directory of grants available to businesses who want to manage their emissions. Time, however, presents a more difficult hurdle. Shirel Berger, owner and chef of Opa Restaurant in Tel Aviv, says she’s spending more of her time figuring out supply chain substitutes for things that were once abundant. “The winter [in Israel] isn’t cold enough, so we don’t get enough olives on trees or nectarines and plums for the summer,” she says. So far, she’s mitigated this by working with organic small growers and developing a “dynamic menu,” never serving the same dish each season. But there’s the question of how long this innovative stopgap plan will remain sustainable. “I do think that it’s going to be harder to find produce,” she says. Berger’s plant-based menu keeps the fine dining restaurant’s greenhouse gas emissions down, however, this determination is not always compatible with her business’s demands: “We really try to source local and pollute as little as possible, but it’s not 100 percent.” Left with little choice, small businesses are adjusting to the effects of climate change, but Sulaimani says many owners are still missing an opportunity to better engage with their customers: “We live in an age of conscious consumers… I think most of our customers really appreciate understanding what’s going on around the world, supply chains, where their products come from, and what are the factors impacting that. It’s a learning lesson for everybody.”