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Analyze Your Audience For Higher ROI

Guest post by: Susan Hamilton

Article Overview: If you believe everything you hear about marketing over social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter, or even some marketing industry blogs, you're probably getting an inaccurate perspective for your particular business.

Analyze Your Audience For Higher ROI

If you believe everything you hear about marketing over social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter, or even some marketing industry blogs, you're probably getting an inaccurate perspective for your particular business.

I hear it all the time when I go to speak with people one-on-one about their scenario. Everyone's heard something about marketing in this economy. Pervasive thought in blog form is usually accompanied by a column of comments applauding the strategy that must be true for your business. Often business owners and managers are convinced they've just read the marketing bible.

While some marketing generalities are true, not all advice is the right advice for your company. If you don't consider the audience you're writing for, if you don't consider the audience you want to write for … well, you may as well write to yourself.

For instance, maybe you believe some of these statements:

• Blog posts won't be read if they're long (above 300 words).



• Keep product facts out of your advertising; no one cares.



• Website page copy should be optimized for 2-3 keywords per page.



• Industry relevant terminology should be used throughout online marketing.



• Writing with authority means using highly technical or collegiate-level words.



• Use keyword-rich anchor text throughout your website.



• Social media is about building relationships. Don't sell.



• Automation takes the personal touch out of your online work and people hate it.



• Email marketing is spam.

Write to improve your best customer's understanding of your product or service, and you'll get results. Period. Grammar, spelling, keywords, and even social media are very important, but let's face facts.

You won't get in front of your audience if you don't write as though they're sitting in front of you. That's true for web copy, landing pages, email marketing - everything. They need to know how your product improves their business or domestic scenario or they just don't care.

If you can't hook them with your title, your words will not be read. If they get past the title but can't understand you, forget it. If you managed to get them past the title and body text, but gave them no direction, you just wasted your time. Each market is different.

What interests your client?

There's very little factual information in the above bullet points. A handbag designer won't be contacted for a handbag sale if the nuances of the handbag aren't exposed through copy. Any reader who isn't interested in those facts is not the target market, and appealing to them won't ever matter. The object of a handbag designer website is not to convince anyone to buy a handbag. The object of that website is to convince a handbag collector, admirer, or lover to purchase the right handbag for her (him).

Likewise, why does one go to a plumbing website? Probably not to peruse plumbing information.

A visitor will look for a plumbing website when they need remodeling, repair, or emergency work. Did the plumber's visibility on Twitter within his local audience get him a phone call because he became friends with his followers?

Or did he get the call because the material posted from his blog over time was relevant, humorous, and interesting to most people's common issues and his company name, phone number, and website was in front of a local audience when they needed help? (Think mobile.)

Let's go through those bullets and with a renewed perspective, really think about your audience.

• Relevant, interesting, and helpful information posted to your blog has no length requirement or limit. If your post doesn't really matter, no one will read it. If your post matters, is well-written and you promote it, the right audience will find it - and they'll read it no matter how long it is. Your subject matter may be long. It might be short. What do your readers want to know?



• Facts matter. Fluff does not. While you may see Superbowl ads with little to offer, their marketing budget for those ads is usually not justified by increased sales. Smartly used, well-composed, consumer-interest facts with good copy will help to sell your product. No one will buy your product without knowing the facts.



• Optimizing your website pages for more than one keyword can look ridiculous. It isn't necessary, and it's not a good recommendation. Using keywords and phrases effectively, without stuffing, is far better advice for most companies. You're always writing for a person; if you take that out of the equation or give more weight to a spider, your sales will suffer. Go look at your web copy and determine if you've alienated your reader.



• Common industry terminology that's only common to the provider is useless to your audience; make sure they understand you.



• To enhance your reader's experience, keep your Flesch-Kincaid reading level between 5.5 and 7.4, around a seventh-grade level. Everyone is simply too bombarded with information, and your job is to make consuming it as easy as possible. Save the big words for your white papers and case studies.



• If all of your anchor text is keyword-rich, natural link appearance suffers. Use only one keyword phrase anchor text link per page. Use words that naturally guide your reader from one page to another in other links.



• It's a sorry dog that won't wag its own tail. Promote your links and advice on social media. Don't be obnoxious, and engage.



• Automation makes business possible. Learn what your customer needs to access with ease and watch your sales increase.



• Spam means sending unsolicited emails to people, and doing it frequently. Make sure your customers and clients know you collect that information to stay in touch with them, and then use it to share specials, discounts, warranty information, or even product best practices. Always be certain you're CAN-SPAM compliant and you won't have anything to worry about. Email marketing is just smart.

Understand what your audience truly needs from you, and deliver it. That's one investment that will never disappoint.

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Article Tags: audience, blogs, facebook, marketing industry, media platforms, perspective, Susan Hamilton Copywriting, twitter
Referred by: http://affiliatepowercentral.com



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