Targeting is an advertising mechanism, that allows you to segment some visitors, who meet a defined set of criteria, from the general audience. It helps increase the effectivity of the campaign. Targeting is also used in email marketing for segmentation. Find out more. This video made by tutor2u considers three marketing strategies along with its benefits and explains the way to combine them effectively. Why is targeting important? Without a proper targeting strategy, your product promotion is doomed to failure. To sell successfully, firstly you need to know who you're selling to, and then pick up the most relevant strategies and techniques for each segment. With an effective plan, you’ll be able to reach the following goals. Attract quality leads.Only target leads who are most likely to be interested in your product. This way, you won’t spend extra money and effort on advertising to big audiences. Stay competitive. The more accurately you target, the more competitors you leave behind. Clients always choose brands that provide relevant offers. Improve your service and products. To develop an effective targeting strategy, you need to deeply analyze your audience. You’ll get to know your clients’ needs and wants. This information will help you improve your product and service. What’s the difference between segmentation, targeting, and positioning? These three elements play an important role in promoting a new product. You can’t escape any of them since an effective marketing strategy implies using each one step by step. Segmentation comes first. It refers to the process of dividing your entire audience into smaller groups called segments. They are made up of people whose needs and interests are similar. They respond differently to your campaigns. Without a proper segmentation strategy, you won’t be able to enter the next stage successfully. The second stage is called targeting. Now that you have your audience segmented, you start developing the strategy and the tactics that will help you communicate with people more effectively. Analyze each segment, create a buyer persona for each, and then work on designing the best promotions for each group. This way, you target different segments of your audience using the most relevant techniques. The last stage is positioning. This stage is extremely important since its success predetermines your place in the market. Your task here is to persuade your potential clients that your brand is the best choice. You should create an image of your company in your customers’ minds. Educate them about the benefits of using your product and do your best to be associated with a particular need. One of the brands that managed to do this successfully is Coke as far as almost every person thinks of this manufacturer when talking about soda. Targeting mechanism The audience is monitored during the information gathering stage. At this stage of targeting, a marketer monitors consumers' tastes, finds out which stores they visit, what actions they carry out on the Internet, what the users are interested in, etc. The information analysis stage allows you to conclude the preferences of your target audience, their tastes,methods of communication, and their purchasing behavior from a significant amount of data gathered from a large number of users. Accordingly, you should focus your marketing efforts on the people who are most likely to engage with your brand based on the information that you gained from your analyses. Inthe next stage, it is possible to present an information message, a product, a service profitably for the target audience. After the audience is determined, an advertising and information message should be created. Advertising is placed only on those information resources that are visited by a potential audience (specific sites, pages, sections of stores, departments of the stores, television broadcasts that are most relevant to your target audience). Targeting Types Theme-based targeting. Advertising and information messages demonstration according to a particular topic. Contextual targeting. Message demonstrations according to users’ interests. Geotargeting. Advertising demonstrationbased onthe geographical location of your target audience Behavioral targeting.This is oneof the most promising types of targeting. The essence of behavioral targeting is introducing a mechanism to collect information about users’ actions: routes of travel, favorite places to visits, shopping behaviors, etc. Sociodemographic targeting. This is a concentration based on age, gender, income, social status, etc. Targeted Email Marketing Marketers use targeting to craft relevant and personalized email campaigns. This mechanism lets you divide your mailing list into small segments with shared interests and offer them different goods and content. By doing this, you'll get a higher ROI and ensure customer retention. Convert prospects into leads with LIKE.TG! Carry out segmentation to send the most relevant emails with valuable offers to each client. LIKE.TG offers ready-made segments and advanced options for better performance. Register and send segmented emails! After the registration in LIKE.TG, you can group your clients by their rating, age, location, occupation, gender, and based on their actions — the way they interact with your emails. We provide ready-to-use segments available for free. If your client base is less than 500 subscribers, try segmentation within the free pricing plan. Send up to 15,000 emails absolutely for free to 500 subscribers monthly. Create an email campaign

Total cost is the sum of expenses a company needs to manufacture a specific level of output. It’s a total of fixed and variable costs, calculating which helps product managers evaluate their overall profit margin. Business owners should possess information about profits and expenses to reassure that their companies are running smoothly. Total cost gives entrepreneurs an understanding of their firms’ profitability and performance. In this article, we’ll reveal several steps necessary to calculate the total cost and discuss an example. How to Calculate Total Cost Different types of businesses leverage the formula to evaluate their overall profit margin. If a firm doesn’t bring the expected revenue, it’s up to its owner to decide whether to make any changes to turnover or pricing. So if you need to obtain the measure, let’s review four steps to calculate it for your company. Sum up all fixed costs. First of all, you need to determine the fixed costs of your company. These are business expenses that aren’t influenced by the number of manufactured products or services. They include machinery, property taxes, equipment, rental or lease payments, etc. Once you know your fixed costs, sum them all up. Find all variable costs. The next step is to figure out the variable costs. These refer to expenses influenced by the number of products manufactured by a particular company. Expenses on raw materials, utility costs, packaging, wages, and commissions are examples of variable costs. Therefore, you need to obtain a total of these expenses. Add all fixed and variable costs to define the total cost. Once you have all your fixed and variable costs, you can estimate the total cost by adding all these expenses. Check the income statement to find your business’s costs. Financial documents contain records about the performance of a certain company and its business activities. That’s why it may be helpful to check an income statement to find information on the costs of a business. Besides the income statement that nearly every company has, you might need to consult a balance sheet to check your company’s financial health. Now that you know the necessary steps to calculate the total cost, let’s proceed to the example. Total Cost Example Businesses use the formula to obtain this metric that enables them to assess their profitability. Business owners compare total costs at different time intervals to figure out whether a firm needs to boost sales, review pricing, or generate more revenue. Let’s imagine that there’s an apparel company. The owner of this business needs to calculate the total cost to determine whether the firm brings any profit. For this purpose, there is a necessity to obtain all fixed costs of this business. You can see them below. The second step is to find all variable costs and sum them up. Now when you have the necessary measures, you can easily estimate the total cost by adding all of the expenses. Hence, total cost helps entrepreneurs define the profitability of their companies. Taking this metric into account also helps assess a company’s performance and determine its position in the market compared to competitors’. The results can be used to review how successful a particular product or product range is.

Targeted advertising is a type of Internet advertising that delivers promotional messages to a customer according to their specific traits, interests, and preferences. Brands get this information by tracking consumer profiles and activity on the Internet. This video by Online Ads Edu explains what targeted advertising is and how it works. Although there is a discussion to be had about the ethics of collecting and using personal data for promotional purposes, targeted advertising has proved its efficiency as a marketing channel. In this article, we’ll learn more about this tool and explore the main tactics and successful examples of targeted advertising campaigns. Benefits of Targeted Advertising Hitting the right audience Advanced personalization Lower cost Instant results Higher ROI In-depth analytics Re-engagement More than half of the global population uses the Internet every day. People look for products and services using search engines, browse social networks, visit online stores, and so on. Brands employ different marketing channels to make the most of these activities. Targeted advertising has a ton of advantages compared to other ways of promoting a business online. Hitting the right audience. Over 50% of prospective customers turn out to be a mismatch for businesses. Targeted advertising allows brands to interact with prospects who are most interested in their products. It increases the chances of selling to a particular buyer. Advanced personalization. Personalization is crucial for online marketing, and targeted advertising lets you take it to the next level. Knowing your audience's traits, interests, and behavior, you can offer them the most suitable products or services. Lower cost. Compared to traditional offline advertising or complex online strategies, such as content marketing, targeted advertising is cheaper. Better yet, using this marketing channel, you never go over budget; as soon as you reach the limit, an advertising platform stops showing your ad. Instant results. Most online marketing strategies require a long time to reach your goals. For instance, SEO brings desirable outcomes after six months or more. In contrast, targeted advertising is a great way to acquire customers here and now. Higher ROI. Showing relevant offers to your audience, you get higher conversion rates, improved sales, and boosts revenue. Meanwhile, sophisticated targeting on advertising platforms lets you reduce the price for a click. As a result, you get a better return on investment. In-depth analytics. Most advertising platforms show your campaign’s performance in real-time, provide advanced analytics, and let you make timely changes to achieve better results. Re-engagement. First-time website visitors or ad viewers rarely convert into buyers. You can set up targeted ads to re-engage these potential customers with your brand over and over again. It helps prospects move down the pipeline towards making their purchase. These benefits make targeted advertising one of the most popular ways to promote business online. For instance, in 2016, European brands invested over 16 billion euros into targeted ads. Read on for more targeted advertising statistics. Targeted Advertising Statistics Statistics is a golden opportunity to spot trends and get useful insights. We have selected some facts to help you better understand targeted advertising. 27% of internet users consider targeted ads to be a convenient way to learn more about appealing products. Meanwhile, 51% of respondents believe this type of advertising is an inappropriate use of personal data. Young audiences are the most positive about targeted advertising. 41% of respondents aged 18-24 like discovering new goods through this promotional channel. In 2018, contextual advertising was the most popular type of targeted advertising. Thus, 80% of European businesses preferred it over behavioral and geographical targeting. In 2016, 90% of the digital display advertising market growth came from formats and processes that use behavioral data. Behaviorally targeted ads proved to be the most cost-effective type of advertising. Their average click-through rate was 5.3 times higher than in advertising, which does not use behavioral data. You may puzzle over the question of how exactly targeted advertising systems gather and use your data and online behavior. We’ll explore the mechanics further. How Does Targeted Advertising Work? To place a targeted ad online, you need to set up a campaign on an advertisement network. Those networks show ads to users based on their data – demographics, buying history, or digital behavior. Advertising platforms can collect data from different sources. The most common of them are cookies on the websites you’ve browsed. Cookies are tiny files that store information about your on-site actions or purchases and transfer them to the CRM or third-party services. Another source of information about you is search engines. They analyze search queries and users’ habits to employ this data for showing them paid ads on the search engine results page.Finally, advertising platforms get your data from social media profiles. Social networks store information about your age, gender, beliefs, preferences, and so on. Knowing your main characteristics and online behavior, advertising platforms can show you targeted ads on different websites. For instance, if you often browse makeup products on the Lookfantastic website, you may see ads from other cosmetics retailers on various online platforms. Brands often use targeted ads to show you the products you’ve looked through before. This tactic is called retargeting. It helps businesses spark your interest in returning to their websites and purchasing the product. As you can see, brands use a whole lot of data about you to target their ads. Based on the information used, we can distinguish different types of targeting. Let’s delve deeper into them. Types of Targeted Advertising As targeted advertising grows, online platforms get more and more data about their users and can offer advertisers different types of targeting. Here are the most popular of them: Demographic targeting. This type of targeted advertising focuses on the audience’s characteristics – age, gender, salary, nationality, and more. Behavioral targeting. The core of this type is potential customers’ on-site and purchasing behavior. Platforms assemble data on the items users browse through and show ads according to it. Contextual targeting. Contextual targeting implies displaying ads based on a website’s content. For instance, a publisher may show toy advertising on a parenting website. Geographic targeting. This type focuses on the potential buyer’s location. Time targeting. The base for these ads are periods when users show the highest online activity. For example, ads occur from 4 PM to 8 PM, when people typically travel home from work. Device targeting. Advertisers can target potential customers according to the device they use. We’ve unpacked a few common types of targeting. However, advertising platforms offer many more options. Let’s move on and find out how to work with ads on Facebook and Instagram. How to Do Targeted Advertising How to do targeted advertising on Facebook How to do targeted advertising on Instagram Setting up a campaign on most advertising platforms is easy as pie. However, to get sustainable results, you’ll need to get in hot water and learn as you go. To help you out, we’ve prepared tips on Facebook and Instagram targeted advertising. How to do targeted advertising on Facebook To make the most of your Facebook advertising, follow our comprehensive guide. It will teach you to create ads and give a few pieces of advice. In this article, we’ll sum up the main steps of setting up a Facebook campaign: Choose an objective. You can opt for a Facebook page promotion, getting more website visitors and leads, or promoting your business locally. You can advertise particular types of content as well. Create an ad. Facebook allows you to go for a video, single image, carousel, and slideshow. To get more inspiration, follow our guide on creating Facebook ads. Define your audience. Facebook lets you choose between a great many targeting options, from geographic location to lookalike audiences. Define the duration and budget. The system will show you the approximate results of the campaign with the selected parameters. The key to success in targeted advertising is keeping track of your performance and making timely changes. To measure and analyze your campaigns effectively, follow Facebook’s guidelines. Also, you may reinforce your Facebook advertising with other marketing tools. For instance, you can create a chatbot to nurture leads. To set up your bot for Facebook, try LIKE.TG and send up to 10,000 messages for free. How to do targeted advertising on Instagram Instagram is part of the Facebook family, so you need to go to Facebook Ad Manager and follow the steps listed in the previous section. Out of the box, the ad manager will publish your ad on both Facebook and Instagram. You can switch to Instagram only but bear in mind that images posted on Facebook via Instagram drive 23% more engagement. You can also promote existing Instagram posts and stories out of the mobile app. It’s way simpler than setting up a campaign from Facebook Ads Manager. To learn more about boosting your organic publications on this network, follow our guide on Instagram promotion. To drive desirable outcomes for your targeted advertising campaigns, you have to learn through trial and error. You can speed up the process and exclude some mistakes by following the tips we’ve picked for you. Targeted Advertising Tips Target your existing customers Show ads to your fans Split test your audiences Avoid hyper-targeting Target the lower stages of the funnel Benefit from lookalike audiences Marketers have accumulated a lot of tricks during the years of working with targeted advertising. Let’s get into the details of the best practices and adopt some of them. Target your existing customers Acquiring new customers is often the primary purpose of launching targeted advertising campaigns. However, this might not be the best strategy as the probability of selling to new buyers is around 5-25%. Meanwhile, loyal customers make purchases in 60-70% of cases! To drive more sales and boost your ROI, target your advertising at existing customers. You can do this by creating customer lists and feeding them to Facebook, Google, and Twitter. The first one targets your customers with the Custom Audiences tool, the second – with Customer Match, the third – with Tailored Audiences. Show ads to your fans This piece of advice resembles the previous one, but it only suits those who have a loyal audience on Facebook. This social network allows you to target your ads at people who have liked your page. Showing ads to your fans affects your ROI dramatically. One experiment showed that this tactic increased a campaign's return on investments by 35 times. The reason for success here is the same as with targeting loyal customers; this audience already knows you, likes you and trusts you. Split test your audiences You probably heard that split testing is essential for achieving your advertising goals. Testing various targeting options, you can find the most effective one. To run split tests on your audiences, create two campaigns, and choose slightly different targeting parameters. To get crystal clear results, change only one feature at a time. It may be gender, age, interests, devices, and so on. By testing your audiences, you’ll finally find your most promising prospects and learn to target them more effectively. Avoid hyper-targeting Targeting settings allow you to pick your prospective customers precisely. In fact, it might be harmful as targeting a very narrow and specific audience can drive poor results. Try to avoid overly narrow targeting and embrace a broader clientele instead. What quantity of audience size is best for particular networks? The only way to figure it out is by testing. However, if you need a cheat sheet, consider LinkedIn recommendations. This social network advises opting for an audience of over 50,000 for Sponsored Content and Text Ads. Target the lower stages of the funnel People in the lower stages of the sales funnel have higher chances to convert into customers. Thus, targeting them is a must if you aim at growing sales. Google and Microsoft’s advertising networks allow you to target in-market audiences – those who are searching for a specific product and are probably ready to buy it. To find these people, platforms use data on the sites they have browsed, the proximity and frequency of visits, clicks on similar ads, and conversions. The good news is that you can use the same mechanics on YouTube; this platform offers Custom Intent Audiences. YouTube uses broad-match related search queries that people looked for on Google. Benefit from lookalike audiences Advertising networks on search engines and social media let you expand your audience through lookalike targeting. This feature mirrors your custom audiences and offers you users with the same defining characteristics. This way, you can increase the number of promising prospects that you target. Applying the tactics listed above, you can improve your targeted advertising results. To learn how to do it more efficiently and creatively, read on – we’ll examine examples of stunning targeted campaigns. Targeted Advertising Examples When it comes to targeted advertising, you need to not only spot your audience’s preferences but also to show creative and attention-grabbing content. To ignite your inventiveness, look at the advertising campaigns we’ve picked for you. Amanda Foundation Amanda Foundation used behavioral and geographical targeting to find homes for animals that were spending their last days at shelters across Los Angeles. To increase the chances for pets, the non-profit showed ads to people who were the most likely to adopt a particular cat or dog. The ads appeared on websites according to users’ demographics and browsing behavior. For instance, if a person was prone to a sedentary lifestyle and interested in small dogs, they saw banners with chihuahuas or toy terriers. In the picture below, you can see the set of ads for cats and dogs in search of a home. Each message introduces the viewer to a suitable pet. The text highlights the traits that a specific animal and the ad viewer have in common. Sephora The cosmetics retailer, Sephora, launched a Facebook campaign to boost sales during the holiday season. The company targeted people who visited the Sephora website and left without making a purchase. The second segment was Americans interested in beauty, skincare, and makeup. In its ads, Sephora showed viewers the type of products they would prefer. For instance, if a person had shown previous interest in or intent to buy makeup online, they saw the ad with makeup products. Each ad started with an engaging video and several product images below it. After tapping the post, a viewer went to the Sephora website. The links led directly to the category presented in the ad. Also, a user could switch to a different group of products and choose a particular item to buy. Tesco The retailer, Tesco, chose Facebook for its advertising campaign in Malaysia. The company used geographical targeting to reach people who lived near specific stores. The brand used discounts to incentivize visits to its supermarkets. Tesco showed three ads that offered prospects to save from 30 to 100 Malaysian Ringgit. Viewers had to save unique codes generated for each ad on Facebook. Later, the social network reminded users to redeem the coupon in the nearest shop. Each ad was a simple combination of an image, text, and call to action. The promotion showed the amount that customers would save, if they take the chance. J2O J2O provides another example of the creative use of Facebook video ads. The company wanted to increase brand awareness before Christmas and boost its seasonal drink sales. J2O targeted the people in the UK aged 18-44. The campaign consisted of three eye-catching and engaging videos with a brand character – a colorful alpaca, Mojo, which you can see in the picture below. Facebook Ads Manager optimized each display to show the best-performing versions. Targeted advertising may be the perfect option to acquire new leads, move them down the sales funnel, or re-engage loyal customers. However, do not rely on this channel alone – a complex approach drives the best results. Enrich your marketing strategy with email and SMS campaigns, chatbots, and web push notifications – register with LIKE.TG.

Subscription marketing is a strategic approach aimed at transitioning customers to a subscription-based business model, where clients pay a specific fee to access a product or service. This method enables companies to forecast their revenues, foster long-term relationships with customers, and maintain their loyalty. In this article, we’ll unveil why businesses opt for subscription marketing strategy and guide you in building an effective one for your company. In addition, we’ll provide you with 8 best practices to implement a subscription marketing strategy. Why do businesses choose a subscription marketing strategy? Subscription marketing provides a way for business owners to acquire and retain customers. However, this isn't the sole reason for companies to adopt this approach. Further, you’ll find out some more arguments why it’s crucial. Customer retention. A subscription-based business model is a perfect way of keeping repeat customers. With its help, you can retain existing customers without any need to spend additional costs on acquiring new ones. Customers can renew subscriptions to your product or service on an ongoing basis. Recurring revenue. After buying a subscription, people usually stay with the company for months or even years. By doing so, customers create a stable stream of recurring revenue for such companies. Usually, subscription-based businesses have a small number of loyal customers who bring most of the revenue to their companies. Lasting relationships with customers. Subscription helps establish a long-lasting bond with clients. This business model differs from usual for all buying-selling processes because it lasts longer. When customers stay for a long time with a business, they become familiar with it. It makes them repurchase the subscription. Upselling and cross-selling. Customer loyalty enables the smooth implementation of upselling and cross-selling strategies. Loyal subscribers, trusting your business, are open to additional features for an extra charge, contributing to increased revenue. Demand forecasting. The subscription-based business provides owners with insights into customer preferences, their needs, and problems. By analyzing customer behavior and desires, you can improve their products with some additional features and add-ons. This way, you’ll be able to satisfy a wider audience and encourage them to purchase a plan. Implementing this strategy positively impacts various aspects of brands, including revenue, and comes with several benefits: Cost-effectiveness. With a subscription model, your focus is on building a loyal audience for long-term subscriptions, eliminating the need for continuous customer acquisition efforts. Unlike brands where customers make a single purchase and leave, a subscription model ensures predictable revenue without ongoing lead generation costs. Customer satisfaction. Subscription service allows you to provide your customers with personalized experiences. This makes a huge difference when it comes to buying decisions. If you manage to meet clients’ needs and desires, you’ll be able to get new loyal subscribers. Reduced customer acquisition cost. Since the subscription business depends a lot on loyal repeat customers, you don’t have to pay again and again for customer acquisition. This way, you can avoid the time and money-consuming process of acquiring new customers all the time. However, you’ll need to do it once to generate leads. Yet you won’t do it regularly so your costs will be secure. Steady income. Loyal repeat subscribers mean that your company is supported. If they stay with your brand, these customers bring you steady revenue. So your company can succeed and expand. Now that you know about the pros, it’s time to proceed with building an effective subscription marketing strategy for your business. How to build an effective subscription marketing strategy? Creating a loyal customer base that continuously subscribes and provides consistent revenue requires a well-thought-out subscription marketing strategy. Though it may demand effort from your team, the results will be worth it. In this section, we'll guide you on how to manage this process effectively. Let's dive in. Think of the right pricing model. Customer decisions are heavily influenced by the subscription price. Choose a fee that is competitive yet affordable for your company and target audience. Avoid overpricing your product to maintain customer interest and prevent them from exploring alternatives. Develop an intuitive site. If you want your potential customers to instantly explore all the benefits and features of your product, make sure that your site works properly. The features, essential information, and a call to action button should be visible. Prioritize site speed and error-free functionality to enhance user experience. Attract customers with free trials and free plans. Offer free trials to allow prospects to experience your product or service before committing. Free plans can showcase basic features, enticing leads to upgrade to premium options. This approach gives customers a firsthand understanding, empowering them to make informed decisions. Incorporate an auto-renewal system. Simplify the subscription process with auto-renewal systems. Customers only need to set up their payment method once, eliminating the hassle of filling in details for each transaction. Streamlining payments enhances user convenience and encourages subscription renewals. Provide discounts for longer subscriptions. Encourage long-term commitment by offering discounts for extended subscription periods. For instance, a 10% or 20% discount on yearly subscriptions incentivizes customers to stay loyal. This benefits subscribers and strengthens their relationship with your company, reducing the likelihood of exploring competitors. Retain customers with special offers. As a wise business owner, you need to care not only about new customers but about your loyal clients as well. You can use special offers, loyalty, and referral programs to show your care. By providing customers with rewards, you can appreciate them for their loyalty. It’s a perfect way of establishing long-lasting relationships with them. Monitor performance metrics. Focus on long-term metrics to evaluate your subscription model's performance effectively. Key indicators include customer lifetime value, churn rates, customer engagement, retention rates, and referrals. These metrics provide valuable insights into customer behavior and help optimize your marketing strategy for sustained success. Now that you know the process step by step, it’s time to find out what will help your team succeed with a subscription-based model. We’ve prepared some of the best practices to apply. 8 Best Practices to Implement a Subscription Marketing Strategy There are plenty of subscription marketing strategies, yet they don’t guarantee success for your business. In this section, we’ve gathered all the strategies that work and bring measurable results to companies. Let’s explore them in more detail. Add positive reviews from satisfied clients. There’s nothing better for customers than other clients recommending a specific product or service. Effective marketing campaigns, calls, and offline events don’t have the same influence on the audience as personal recommendations. That’s why it’s crucial to have those on your website. To gain customer trust, you need to ask your satisfied customers to leave their positive reviews. It’ll be great to encourage them with special offers, discounts, or free renewals for their feedback. Once you get the reviews, make sure to add them to your site. They’ll positively influence buyers’ decisions in the future. Collaborate with opinion leaders. Now when almost everyone is active on Instagram, it’s essential to establish an online presence on the most popular social media platforms. One of the fastest ways to reach a wide audience of your potential customers is by partnering with influencers. Their endorsement introduces your product or service to a vast audience, making your company a viable solution for potential customers seeking similar products. Incorporate a referral program. A referral program is an excellent way of attracting qualified leads. You don’t have to spend additional costs on customer acquisition and encourage uninterested people to purchase your subscription plans. The referral program enables your loyal customers to bring people who already know about the benefits of your product and have a clear understanding of your company. They come and purchase subscriptions to receive their perks. Such a program streamlines the lead generation process. Run a loyalty program. A successful business always has a base of loyal customers who bring the most of its revenue. To become loyal, clients should trust your company and be happy with it. After making sure that your audience is satisfied with your product, consider implementing a loyalty program. Reward your clients for being loyal to your business and repurchasing the subscription. You can provide various rewards presented in the form of a discount, special offer, gift, add-ons, free advanced features, or a monthly subscription. Such incentives will help you continue good relationships with your customers. Offer no-commitment free trials. The free trial works well with prospective customers. If you have a free trial that doesn’t require credit card information, people can come to you and try your product. After testing it, they’ll make up their minds about whether it suits them. This way, you can showcase the benefits of your products and generate more subscribers. Provide special offers. Special offers work well for new and existing customers. They might differ based on the stage of the customer journey. For instance, you can provide free trials and zero sign-up fees to generate more prospects and give free renewals to retain existing clients. As a result, you get more potential customers and reduce customer churn. Give discounts for repeat purchases. Cultivate customer loyalty by offering discounts on repeat and significant purchases. Appreciate customer loyalty and encourage higher spending. Discounts serve as powerful tools for fostering customer relationships and boosting revenue. Provide reduced pricing for yearly subscriptions. If you want customers to stay loyal to your company longer, provide discounts for annual subscriptions. This way, you offer benefits to clients and ensure that they’ll stay with you for one more year. It results in a stable income. Congrats, now you know what subscription marketing is and why it’s essential. Hope that our step-by-step guide and effective strategies will help you reach your business goals.

A targeted mailing list isnecessaryfor productive and profitable email marketing. A mailinglistis a list of your subscribers’ email addresses. There is a significant difference between a standard mailing list and a targeted mailing list. The quality of your mailing list determines the results of your work. A targeted mailing list is a segmented list according to some criteria. Segmentation Criteria Age Gender Place of residence Occupation Income Interests Hobbies Preferences Targeted mailing lists is to include one essential component – the recipient’s history of interaction with your business. Why use targeted mailing lists? A highly-targeted mailing list will help youto: Establish relationships with clients; Increase customer loyalty; Receive better conversions and higher ROI. How to Get a Targeted Mailing List The first and the most important thing – your mailing list must be LEGAL. This means that you have to resist the temptation to buy a mailing list. A purchased mailing list won’t bring you long-term results. Recipients fromsuch a mailing list are not interested in your work. They have never permitted you to send them emails, that’s why you have high chances togo into the spam folder. Targeting Mechanism Analyze your current database of customers. Make sure that all the customers are active and interested in your business, as well as their personal information – it is to be actual. Do your best to get information. The quality and quantity of information about the customers will help you to create personalized campaigns. It can be gathered from questionnaires. Offer exciting and valuable content. Your content is the first thing to make subscribers interested. While you offer useful and relevant content, your customers will be with you. They should feel the necessity of your work. Give workshops, webinars, conferences, competitions, exhibitions, etc. Make your customers feel the importance of your work. Promote your company with the help of partners.The partner’s website is a great chance to reach new customers. Search for new sources. Make use of the information on the history of relationships with the clients, their activities on your web-site, purchases. Analyze your interactions for better results. Make an effort while creating a targeted mailing list and enjoy the results!

A target audience is a group of peoplethat share similar needs and interests that a business aims to serve. These people are the end users in most cases. In this video, you’ll get to know two different strategies that will help you find your target audience without much sweat. Check out! Look back on your childhood and recall the day-to-day situation when you were about to beg for a piece of candy. The only thing that stopped you was the wise choice of asking your parents. Every little detail mattered, including your approach and parents’ mood. It’s the same with marketing — the right audience determines the success of your product. What is the no. 1 mistake in business? Many startups tend to fail during their first operational year as they try to appeal to everyone. Each individual has different tastes and needs. So, every company should offer a specifically targeted product. Otherwise, a marketing campaign may result in nothing as it casts too wide a net. Why is identifying the target audience so crucial for a company? Beat the competitors Reduce costs Know your customer base Find growth potential It’s essential to realize precisely who your final consumers are because it assistswithcreating compelling marketing communication strategies. Thus, it is critical to narrow the focus to your core audience. First of all, identifying your proper market sector makes it possible to focus your efforts cost-effectively. Without having to target everybody, you will minimize the money invested in your project and avoid the most common mistakes in email campaigns. One of the examples of successful market targeting is Facebook Ads. The tool allows you to select the audience based on its interests. Sending the same message to each client is a bad idea. You will receive a better return on investment by targeting clients that may be interested in your offer. Those are just some of the examples of why it is critical to target your audience correctly. We will dig a bit deeper to provide more reasons. Beat the competitors Each client that you miss because of poor targeting or marketing strategy that does not work smoothly becomes one of your rival’s customers. The idea is that if a person is searching for a specific product or service, they will eventually make a choice, and it does not necessarily have to be one company. It all depends on the effectiveness of your approach to marketing. It is critical to select the “chosen buyers” from the narrow audience. Several loyal customers may guarantee higher profits and conversion rates than many one-time clients. Reduce costs Poorly assessed marketing campaigns will waste your time, money, and nerves. You should not try to launch ads too frequently. It is possible to target the right audience with a single correctly addressed and composed message. Numerous studies have shown a decrease in costs of more than 55% for companies that apply quality audience analysis. Targeted email marketing will help increase CTR and open rates with a minimum of investments. Know your customer base The base means a very narrow and specific audience. If you take into account only students when targeting the market for your online tutoring services, you should still divide them into different categories based on a subject they study, age, level of proficiency. If your service offers advanced subjects, for example, the MBA level, then you should pick young people interested in related disciplines or those who already study in business schools. Drilling down into the nuances makes it possible to tailor campaigns that reach users who are most likely to purchase your products. Find growth potential Almost every business wants to expand and go big one day. Often, a small group of customers provides a chance to grow sales. If you produce milk-free ice cream, you should focus on those consumers who are lactose-intolerant and vegans. They will show you possible waysto expand by sharing fresh ideas and feedback. Types of the Target Audience Demographic information Geographic information Psychographic information Behavioral information The main obstacle on the way to select the proper segment is to target is the number of factors you should consider. You may ignore some of them, but the results will be less accurate. If you wish to reach maximum profitability and cost efficiency in the shortest period,consider the following criteria: Demographic information. It provides businesses with an essential user background, in particular, age, gender, marital status, race, religion, ethnicity, income. It doesn’t require an in-depth analysis, so this data is easy to collect. Geographic information. It means user location. This kind of data is especially important since it provides local businesses with more opportunities. For example, a company that offers surfing equipment may exclude nordic countries while creating an ad campaign and focus their efforts on the South to break down the budget wisely. Psychographic information. This piece of data includes users’ traits, lifestyle, social class, beliefs, interests and preferences, hobbies. That is a chance to dig deeper and know your audience better. You may get this information from a customer preference center, ask via email, or analyze their behavior on your website. Behavioral information. To gather this information, you should monitor the way users interact with your website and create campaigns based on items they view and add to their shopping cart. This way, you will be at the right time and place to convert leads into clients. Now when you are familiar with the types, have a look at how to identify the right audience. Target Audience Analysis Facebook Instagram Tools Google Analytics In-Market Segments Affinities Email segmentation Target audience analysis is the process of investigating the way your consumers interact with a product to create a buyer persona. Luckily, companies today have unlimited access to high shares of data on their potential and existing buyers. It is possible to retrieve such information digitally. Online tools are the most effective way to evaluate your audience based on statistics. Here are the top-recommended resources. Facebook Instagram Tools The insights from these popular social networks are one of the best ways to assess the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns and choose proper audiences. If using Facebook for your business goals correctly, you can filter the potential clients and understand the current needs of your target audience. After all, these two social networks represent the interests and needs of the users. You can gather and review metrics in various groups and communities. Facebook and Instagram both allow narrowing down the audience by choosing demographics, interests, age, gender, and more. Use filters wisely to create ads on these social networks. Instagram business tools, as well as Facebook instruments, can also help to launch and promote events related to your product. Google Analytics In-Market Segments An excellent example is a team of consumers who are looking for the best restaurant or sightseeing attractions in their town to visit. This category of buyers tends to find many options, compare and contrast them based on the critical reviews and customer feedback. Search engines track the entire search process, and you may use Google Analytics to evaluate such actions. Affinities Coming back to Google Analytics, there is another option for businesses. That is called Affinities. The idea is to analyze an individual’s lifestyle and hobbies to obtain an overall picture of their habits and possible demands. Such metrics allow predicting how the preferences and needs of the specific person may change over time. It is essential to learn what people who look for your product or service may also be interested in. Email segmentation This instrument makes it possible to segmentsubscribers with the help of subscription forms and email campaigns. While the tools mentioned above refer more to analytics, this one is best used when you already know who you target or at least have an idea. LIKE.TG is focused on effective email marketing. Even once you have the data and stats necessary to come up with a message for your customers, it is not that easy to craft a targeted email campaign. Often, third-party services like LIKE.TG might be more effective than trying to do everything on your own. The service also offers a statistical analysis based on campaign performance. Businesses can track opens and clicks that allow monitoring the results and improving the existing strategies. Once you know the audience for sure, you can customize and personalize emails so that your clients will feel special. How to Find Your Target Audience Fast First of all, you should answer the following questions: What is the expected age group? Is your audience made of men or women (or both)? Where is the target audience mostly located? What are they interested in? You can also consider some smaller details to get more. Stick to these six steps while analyzing the answers to the questions above: Observe your current clients. Study the competitors using SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats), A/B testing, and PEST analysis (political, economic, socio-cultural, and technological). Come up with buyer personas. Select locations and regions that you plan to focus on. Pick personal characteristics of the potential customer. Analyze and revise the segmented audience. Then, the rest of the pieces of one big puzzle will fall into place faster and simpler. You should also take into account the useful sources of information for your decision-making process. Top-effective Strategies for Reaching the Target Audience Listen to what they say Talk to them directly Build trust and credibility Change the message Pick the right promotional channel What are the most effective strategies used to make your marketing campaigns work? They depend on the target audience heavily. Check out some common tips below. Listen to what they say. Pay attention to the needs of your potential customers.The good idea is to spend more time with the representatives of your target audience and try to find out their demands and preferences. Talk to them directly. If you are too shy to communicate with potential buyers directly, use social networks. You may also hire advertising gurus to create a compelling message. Build trust and credibility. Emphasize that you are an officially registered entity and that you have the necessary guarantees. You should provide some success stories, cases, and customer reviews to increase your credibility. Change the message. You should be ready to rebrand at any time. The needs of modern buyers often change, taking into account the dynamic world. That is why you should always keep up-to-date with the trends. Pick the right promotional channel. Analyze different avenues to discover which one works better with your audience. You may choose several platforms that help pursue different goals. Make sure that you don’t duplicate promotions on these channels; otherwise, you risk to become annoying. Now, when you know target audience types, ways to analyze, and practical tips, start segmenting your audience with LIKE.TG!

SXO (search experience optimization) is a set of methods that improve user experience on search engines. It applies SEO principles and helps enhance UX to meet users’ needs and find answers to their questions. In this article, we’ll uncover the importance of SXO and teach you how to measure and improve it. Why is SXO important? Nowadays, it’s now enough to develop a comprehensive SEO strategy to reach prospects and make them convert. To be successful, a company needs to care about a set of aspects such as web development, content marketing, UX optimization, analytics, conversion rate optimization, etc. With SEO and UX activities, marketers seek to win the attention of as many people as possible and meet their needs with quality content, valuable product features, or an excellent user experience. Companies do it to encourage searchers to take the desired action. It can be a conversion, purchase, or signup. If everything is done right, brands can understand customers’ needs and desires, and get to know their preferences. SXO is essential for a higher level of conversions and sales volume. If you rank high on Google and provide a seamless customer experience, you’ll be rewarded. Besides, search experience optimization helps obtain more customers who come back, improve the content, stay consistent in marketing strategies, and more. Now you know the reasons for SXO, so let’s explore how to improve it. How to improve SXO? Improving SXO is always useful for a business. We’ve prepared some of the most effective strategies that will help you do it. Look through all of them and then decide which of the aspects require your immediate action. Make use of a chatbot. Some customers can figure out how the product works by themselves, but others need help from your company. That’s why your customer support team should always be ready to provide solutions and assistance. There’s an excellent solution to this problem. To provide instant assistance, consider implementing a chatbot. LIKE.TG’s chatbot builder empowers you to facilitate live communication, provide support 24/7, ensure a seamless buyer journey, and help with onboarding and setup. You’ll save time and money. Speed your website load time. According to Unbounce, 70% of consumers say that their decisions to purchase depend a lot on website load time. Your website’s load time greatly impacts customer satisfaction and conversion rate. The faster your website speed, the happier users will be. That’s why you need to pay close attention to web page optimization. As a result, you’ll see instant changes in user experience, conversions, and profits. According to statistics, the first 5 seconds of web page load time are crucial since they influence conversion rates the most. Every additional second of load time reduces the conversion rates of your company. So, keep these facts in mind when you work on website development. Create structured quality content. Content stays among the most important aspects. Well-structured informative content can win hearts and encourage visitors to engage. It has a great impact on ranking and organic traffic. To keep your company in the top positions, you need to publish quality and unique articles on your blog regularly. Remember, the structure of your content, its length, and readability are important. Use original images and infographics to break your articles into logical parts. They will allow readers to perceive your materials faster and easier. Remember about mobile users. According to OuterBox, around 79% of customers use mobile devices for online shopping. This supports the fact that customers prefer using a smartphone to buy products because it’s fast and convenient. You need to provide a website with a mobile responsive design. Create intuitive navigation, clear and visible CTAs, use whitespace, optimize videos and images, and be consistent. As a result, your site will display well on small screens. Use meta tags. Besides quality content, you should also remember about the optimization of meta tags. They help users and Google understand if your content meets searchers’ queries. Create intriguing title tags and meta descriptions that encourage users to click and visit your website. You should include the most relevant and important facts about the content of the article. The ways to improve SXO are clear, it’s time to unveil how to measure SXO. How to measure SXO? To evaluate SXO, you need to identify several important metrics. Below you’ll find out what measures indicate the situation with your search experience optimization. Pay attention to your bounce rate. This metric is about users who visited your website but left it without performing any actions. Look through the pages that might have a high level of bounce rate. Many steps to place an order, additional costs such as taxes, the lack of convenient payment method can become serious reasons for potential customers to leave your site. Check your website for such issues and eliminate them. Remember, an unpleasant experience influences your sales and revenue. Analyze click-through rate. Use Google Search Console to identify how many people clicked the link on the search engine results page that leads to your site. It will help you figure out what to change: meta tags, ads, or content. Calculate conversion rates. By estimating conversions, you’ll be able to uncover whether you succeeded in reaching your goals of bringing in new customers. If you manage to increase your customer base and sales, it means that your SXO strategy works. Estimate the average time visitors spend on your website or page. If you have quality and engaging content, users will spend more time on your website and read different articles. Time will give you a hint whether your content is compelling and meets users’ needs. See your organic traffic. Once you start implementing the steps we’ve mentioned before, you need to analyze the results. See if the content you publish reaches your target groups and resonates with them. You should analyze the changes in your organic traffic from the moment you started improving your SXO. Excellent user experience and SEO are the two aspects that impact conversions, bounce rate, customer satisfaction, and finally, your revenue. You'll see a real difference when you consider our tips on improving SXO. Hope the metrics will help you evaluate SXO for your company.

A subscriber is a person who chose to opt-into your mailing list. Marketers strongly recommend compiling your subscribers' list by asking their permission for it. Otherwise, such mailings are considered to be spam. When people receive mail, they have not opted in for, the chances are that they will mark it as spam. Many spam complaints will contribute badly to your IP address's reputation among popular web clients. Apart from this, you risk being reported to anti-spam organizations like SpamCopor Spamhouse. If you ask people to opt-in for your commercial mailings, your list will be comprised of subscribers who expect to see your mail and are interested in receiving it. You can bouncefrom there to build leadnurturing campaigns and customer loyalty programs, to turn them into your loyal leads. This video by the Deep End uncovers tips and tactics on how to build an email list fast. Ways tosubscribe An opt-in form on the homepage of your website A pop-up window with a subscription form on your website Offer a bonus or a discount in exchange for a subscription Place a subscription formon your social media page Once you have your subscriber list, it is recommended to segmentsubscribers. Segmentation criteria Age and gender Geographical location and time zone New subscribers/active buyers People who abandoned the shopping cart without going through with the purchase The usage of subscriber insights send personalized emails; make relevant offers; choose the right time to send emails; and launch triggered emailcampaigns. With a smart email marketing strategy and minimum costs, you can turn your subscribers into regular customers.

A suppression list is a list that includes email addresses of all the users who opted out of your email campaigns. There is a default feature in LIKE.TG that helps comply with the CAN-SPAM Act, which requires you to add an unsubscribe link to each email. How a Suppression List Works Once a person clicks on the unsubscribe link, fills in the form on the unsubscribe page, or marks your email as spam, LIKE.TG automatically adds their email addresses to a suppression list. We have designed it to protect your sender reputation. The suppressing list is individual for every account. Each time you send an email campaign, the algorithm compares recipients' email addresses with those on the suppression list. If email addresses match, the email won’t be sent to those particular addresses.This means that you can’t accidentally or intentionally send any email to users who have opted out. Otherwise, email providers like Gmail and Yahoo would be more likely to bounce your emails hard, and you would have a hard time delivering your marketing messages in the future. On the screenshot below, you can see how the suppression list looks in LIKE.TG: email addresses, the name and date of the campaign when they left your mailing list, and comments. For your information, we also add hard-bounced addresses to the list of incorrect addresses, so that you won’t waste your resources on invalid addresses. How to Manage the Suppression List You can move users to the suppression list manually. For that, go to the “Mailing lists” category and click the “Unsubscribed” button. After that, fill in a single user’s address, upload a file, or copy and paste up to 10,000 addresses. You can mention the reason for unsubscribing a single email address, and it will appear in the comments of the suppression list.

Synchro marketing is a strategy in which a seller provides customers with attractive offers (discounts, free installments, or free additional products) during a low season to control the irregular demand for a product. It helps capture customers and sell off-seasonal goods. In this article, we’ll cover the difference between synchro marketing and demarketing and review synchro marketing strategies and examples. Synchro Marketing vs Demarketing Synchro marketing and demarketing are the two opposite concepts. The first strategy aims to create a demand for off-seasonal goods, while the second one strives to discourage the demand for a product that a company can’t meet. Let’s review each concept in more detail to know the features. Synchro marketing means using different tactics to control irregular demand. These methods include attractive offers such as free installments, gifts, or discounts to encourage customers to purchase off-seasonal goods. Manufacturers use the tactic during the low season to increase sales and profits. Let’s take the sellers of heaters, for example. During the high season — winter, they experience high demand for their products, and their revenues constantly increase. However, no one buys heaters in summer when the temperature inside and outside is already high. So companies control the irregular demand by providing customers with special offers to sound more attractive. As a result, they increase sales. Demarketing means discouraging the demand for a product because the manufacturers don’t have enough supply or feel unprofitable to deliver products to certain regions. Companies usually increase the price, use scaled-down advertising, and redesign a product to reduce the demand. For example, TATA group discouraged its customers from purchasing Tata Nano because of the low supply that can’t meet customers’ demand. Now that you know the difference, let’s move to the strategies which might come in handy. Synchro Marketing Strategies You can use several strategies to increase the demand for your product during the low selling season. Three tactics below will help you improve sales. Provide customers with attractive offers. To hook the audience’s attention when there’s no demand for a product is no easy task. But still, you can do it with the right approaches. The first thing you should do is to create attractive offers. Do something for free or provide additional gifts. Let’s take sunblocks, for example. To sell these items in winter might be quite challenging. Yet, if you make discounts, provide small gifts, or leverage a “buy one get one free” sales promotion, you have a chance to increase revenue. Reduce the prices. Reduced prices also attract customers. Offer discounts to make your product look more attractive even during the low season. People will appreciate buying an air conditioner with a 50% discount in the off-season. Promote your offers. To capture many customers and raise the demand, you need to promote your products. Use various online channels and traditional advertising to inform customers about your sale. You can advertise it on Instagram, Facebook, or send an email campaign to reach your online audience. As a result, your target audience and the number of sales will increase. Now let’s have a closer look at some real examples to grab some inspiration and develop an outstanding synchro marketing strategy to attain your goals. Examples of Synchro Marketing Synchro marketing is one of the most effective strategies used by cafes, restaurants, and cinemas. Since most customers are free in the evenings and weekends, cafes, restaurants, and other places are crowded with visitors. The demand is very high. However, you won’t find many people enjoying a cup of coffee in a cafe in the morning or working out in a gym at lunchtime. To increase the demand in the morning and afternoon, different companies use various methods. Gyms encourage visitors to purchase gym membership at a lower price, cafes provide complimentary drinks, lunches for special prices, and cinemas sell cheap movie tickets. Clothing stores also sell items for a lower price during the off-season. When there’s no demand for certain items, stores leverage “buy one, get one free item” and give customers big discounts to free the warehouse for new collections. Synchro marketing suits the best during the off-season when the demand is deficient. It helps brands earn revenue and sell goods that aren’t popular at a certain moment.

A subscription form is a form located on any page of a website or blog where the users can fill in the fields with their data to receive emails on topics related to their interests. The primary purpose of the subscription form is opting-in subscribers to your mailing list. Watch this video to create a multichannel subscription form using LIKE.TG visual form builder. Why are subscription forms important? They help generate leads They help collect subscribers’ information It is easy to create and set up them They are convenient to customize They are legal Generate leads. In internet marketing, a subscription form is a crucial tool for lead generation. When subscribers fill in the form placed on a website or blog, they express interest in the company and its products and services. They are not just cold leads, who accidentally run into a webpage — they want to receive the newsletters. Collect subscribers’ information. Subscription forms are a universal and standard way to get users’ data, which is handy for future lead nurturing and for building strong win-win relationships between a company and customers. It is possible to collect the following information: name, email addresses, gender, age, country, etc. Easy to create and set up. It takes little time to create a subscription form with LIKE.TG. You can construct subscription forms with our handy drag-and-drop editor and customize the elements to your liking. Our subscription form editor is a free tool. Convenient to customize. It is convenient to change fonts and colors when creating a subscription form relevant to the brand’s identity. It's legal.A subscription form is a legitimate way to gather email addresses as opposed to buying email lists, which falls under the "spam" category and goes against the law. All you need is to choose a marketing service that provides a form builder, so there's no need to code. Let's generate subscribers! You can create a subscription form that suits your brand style in 30 minutes for free. No technical skills required! Register and create a form! How to Create a Subscription Form State your objectives Choose a type of subscription form Select a mailing list Use our drag-and-drop editor Get the code State your objectives Determine the aim of creating a subscription form and find a place where you want to have it. Choose a type of subscription form Select the “Subscription forms” menu. Click on “Create subscription form.” Choose one of theavailable “Form templates” or the drag-and-drop “Form builder.” In the drag-and-drop editor, choose whether you want to create embedded, pop-up, floating, or fixed structure of subscription form. Select a mailing list Decide the mailing list where you will add new subscribers. When leads fill in the fields in the subscription form and then confirm it in their email, all their data automatically goes to a specific mailing list(s). Use our drag-and-drop editor Drag the elements from the left-hand side and drop them where you need them. The building components available are input, checkbox, radio buttons, drop-down, text, image, and spacer. Customize them on the right-hand side, switch element and design options, to come up with a subscription form that meets your objectives. You can also let users contact your brand via Facebook Messenger and Telegram by adding links to your chatbots. Check out such a form below. Get the code Copy the code generated and insert it on your website. Subscription Form Best Practices Make it as short as possible Place the fields in one column Design in your brand’s style Create a visible CTA button Clean the area around your subscription form Give a clear idea of the subscription's value Launch A/B tests Make it as short as possible. The more fields that a subscription form hasto fill in, the harder it will be for people to complete. Аsk only for the most necessary information — you will have other chances to get more data. For instance, you can offer subscribers to manage their mailing preferences or ask for additional data to send more personalized emails directly. Place the fields in one column. Use one vertical column that looks like a funnel, because multiple columns confuse users. Using a funnel design will ease the subscription process. Though, it is practical to place name and surname fields one after another. Design in your brand’s style. Use the right set of colors and fonts to apply to your brand’s style. Leave enough area between the text fields to ensure everything is readable and clear. Create a visible CTA button. A call-to-action button usually appears at the bottom of a subscription form. Use colors that contrast the background — it will be more eye-catching. Put a brief and strong CTA text to the button. Clean the area around your subscription form. Remember that any videos, ads, or bright images will take people’s attention from your subject matter. Make sure that the areas where you add a subscription form to your website are free from any visually disturbing elements. Give a clear idea of the subscription's value. Help your contacts understand what they will gain by subscribing. The best practice is to send them an automated welcome email to complete a double opt-in process and to say “thank you” for providing their personal information. Launch A/B tests. You can examine which variants of the text, fields, background images, and CTA buttons are getting on. Examples of Subscription Forms Pampers. Here is an example of an embedded subscription form at the bottom of a webpage. It has a lot of space and only requires an email address to be filled in. BrainPickings. Here is an unusual example of when two subscription forms are used at once. This leaves as much room as possible and reduces the number of fields for users. Accessally.Here is an example of a pop-up subscription form. It is clear what value the subscribers get in exchange for sharing their data. If, for some reason, the free subscription form builder in LIKE.TG doesn't meet your requirements, check out this list of alternative subscription management services available in the market today. Create a subscription form

Substitute products are goods that can be used interchangeably. They have similar features and solve the same problems which makes them alternatives. In this article, we’ll review the types of substitute products, tell how price changes influence them and provide examples. Types of Substitute Products There are two types of substitute goods: direct and indirect. Belonging to any of the groups depends on the degree of correlation between the products. If an item can be easily replaced by another one, it's a direct substitute. It means that this product can solve similar problems. Indirect substitutes imply products that are weakly correlated with each other, still, they can replace the main item. Let's have an example to make the difference clear. Say, you're a member of a fitness center with a wide range of activities available. You visit twerk classes. The next time you come to have the training, you find out that your teacher is ill and there will be no twerk lessons. So, you have to choose which class to attend not to lose your money. If you choose reggaeton or vogue, this will be a direct substitute since these are dancing classes as well. If you choose swimming or go to the gym, this will be an indirect substitute. Substitute products occur due to price changes. Let’s take a closer look. Effect of Price Change on Substitute Products If a relative price for a product increases, it makes consumers look for alternatives to save money. Hence, the demand for a more expensive item decreases. Substitute products cause competition on the market which is good since it both provides people with a choice and products at the best price and makes companies develop, improve and create innovations to stay competitive. Substitute products are often compared to complementary products. Let’s see the difference between these two concepts. Substitute Products vs Complementary Products While substitute goods can replace each other because they serve the same functions, complementary products are items that add value to the main product or even can’t be used separately. Let’s have some examples. On the right, you’ll see complementary goods. iPhone — iPhone caseDVD — DVD PlayerEyeshadow — brushCar — petrolMobile phone — sim cardVinyl record player — recordsToothpaste — toothbrush Some of these complementary products can’t be used without the main item, so if its price increases, the demand for a complimentary item goes down. Now, we’ll remind you about famous substitute products. Examples of Substitute Products The following products are often used interchangeably by consumers since they either find them almost the same or the price for one product increases. McDonald’s — KFC and Burger King. Coke — Pepsi. iPhone — Samsung Galaxy. Pizza Hut — Domino’s. Playstation — Xbox. Butter — margarine. Congrats, now you know what substitute products are, their types, changes caused by the price increase and have some examples.

A subscription confirmation email is automatically sentin the second step of a double opt-in. At the first step, users leave their email address in the subscription form. In the second step, they confirm they willingly subscribe to future email campaigns from you.Subscription confirmation emails help to ensure you deal only with engaged users with valid email addresses. Confirmation email goes hand in hand with asubscription form, so watchthe video to learn what subscription form is and how it works. Why are subscription confirmation emails important? On the one hand, it makes a subscription process longer, thus, increases the risks of churn. But what is more important, using subscription confirmation emails, ensures your future email campaigns will be addressed to only interested users, who willingly and consciously joined your list. It also improves the deliverability of your emails alongside with sender reputation. That’s becausea mailing list gathered with a double opt-in method shows lower bounce rates. At last, the double opt-in approach increases your chances of building long-lasting relationships with your audience, so it’s definitely worth your efforts. Does it take a lot of effort to create a subscription confirmation email? Let’s find out! How to Create a Subscription Confirmation Email Create a subscription form Set up a notification about the confirmation email Edit the confirmation email With LIKE.TG, a confirmation email is created in one go with a subscription form, and you can customize it for each form you place on your website. Here’s what you need to do: Step 1: Create a subscription form Go to a “Subscription forms” tab in your LIKE.TG account and click “Create a new form.”Drag and drop the elements like input, checkbox, and radio buttons and customize everything to your liking. You can see a screenshot of a form builder below. After that, move to the “Form options” to set up all the other elements, including the confirmation email. Step 2: Set up a notification about the confirmation email Once a user hitsthesubscribe button, they usually see a notification sayinga confirmation email has been sent to their email address. It is set up by default, like in the example below, but you can customize it if you want. Step 3: Edit the confirmation email Here we are! A subscription confirmation email also has a preset text, like in the screenshot below. You can also change it according to your style of communication. Before you add a subscription form to a web site with a set-up confirmation email, create a “thank-you” page that will appear to a new subscriber when they click the confirmation link. Now that you know how subscription confirmation emails work let’s see some examples from the well-known brands. Subscription Confirmation Email Examples Leica. In this email, the brand reminds what benefits the user will earn and promises customization after the subscription is finished. Booking.com. This confirmation email is written in a formal tone, informing that a click on a link gives full access to the account. EzyDog. It also sounds formal, reminds about the types of emails the subscriber will receive in the future, and offers support if the user has any questions.

A splash page is a standalone web page that emerges before users enter a company’s site. This page can include graphics, animations, or brief information to grab attention and set the site's tone. A splash page isn’t the final destination of users as it does not contain the primary content. In this article, we’ll unveil why you should use a splash page and how it differs from a landing page. We’ll also show you how to create an effective splash page and provide some helpful tips and examples. Why should you use a splash page? A splash page can help business owners attain their primary business goals in various ways. Below, you can find a list of reasons that might make you consider using a splash page for your company: Promotion and marketing. Marketers can promote special events, deals, and discounts with splash pages. Adding information about exclusive deals to splash pages allows you to establish interaction, encourage engagement, and improve visibility. Event promotion. If your business is involved in events, product launches, and conferences, a splash page will help you provide participants with details about upcoming events, launches, webinars, etc. Attention-grabbing introduction. A catchy message, exclusive deal, or exciting event featured on your splash page can be a great introduction to your company’s site. It will help you stay top of mind and establish interaction. Collecting email subscribers. Splash pages enable you to effectively gather email addresses of potential customers. They always include clear and visible call-to-action buttons encouraging subscribing and receiving updates regularly. As a result, you’ll have a long mailing list and an additional channel for nurturing your prospects. Announcements and updates. You can incorporate a splash page for announcing important events or providing subscribers with updates on your product or service. It can cover various scenarios, such as changes to your website, product launches, and any other information you feel is necessary when users discover your brand. Now that you have some reasons to incorporate a splash page into your marketing efforts, it’s time to find out the difference between a splash and a landing page. Splash Page vs Landing Page Splash and landing pages aren’t the same because they serve different business purposes. In this section, we’ll compare the two in detail to identify the main dissimilarities. A splash page is a standalone page that serves as an introduction to a website and usually includes a single message, visual, or animation. This page often has a skip option since not all users like its visual impact. The content featured on a splash page is minimal, including images and straight-to-the-point messages rather than detailed information. Since splash pages have attention-grabbing elements, business owners utilize them for announcements, promotions, and events. A landing page is aimed at gaining conversions. These might include efforts related to lead capturing, product promotion, or other desired actions. A landing page contains detailed information about a specific product, service, or offer, applying testimonials, benefits, and visible CTAs encouraging conversions. It can educate potential customers and lead them toward a specific action that brings prospects toward purchase. You can encounter brands using landing pages for paid advertising, social media promotions, and email marketing because they help. With LIKE.TG, you can build compelling landing pages within minutes without knowledge of the code using pre-built templates. Now that you clearly understand the main difference between the two terms, let’s proceed to the next section to explore how you can develop an effective splash page. How to create an effective splash page? Building an effective splash page requires your team to map everything out, identify your key goals, analyze the target audience, and ensure a seamless user experience. Below are the steps you should take to create a powerful splash page that brings you towards achieving your main objectives. Identify your key goals. Every splash page should have a main purpose, so think about this before creating one for your company. It can be a tool for promoting your new event, showcasing product launches, or collecting prospects’ email addresses. Regardless of the main objectives, identifying them will help you make well-informed decisions on splash page design, elements, message, and other aspects. Understand your target audience. To create a splash page that resonates with your potential clients, you need to know the preferences and interests of your target audience. Consider conducting short research that will help you find a relevant message and visuals and encourage prospects to complete the desired action. Keep your page simple. Make sure that your splash page features only the most important information in brief. Your content should be concise, focusing on the main message and call to action button. It will help you avoid overwhelming leads with unnecessary information. Add compelling visuals. Images or graphics included in your splash page should be high quality and attention-grabbing. Since visuals are the first thing users see, you should ensure that they look good on the page, enticing prospects to convert. Create a brief message. Your message should communicate the main purpose of your splash page. That’s why you need to create a compelling headline and copy supported by visually appealing images. It will prevent you from overwhelming your prospects and encourage the desired action. Add prominent CTAs. Every splash page has a business purpose, so it should include a clear and visible call to action button. Splash pages vary and allow you to encourage site visitors to subscribe for updates, enter your company site, or receive special offers. Ensure responsive design. Since many potential customers use their smartphones to explore information on the web, it’s essential to ensure the mobile-first design of your splash page. You need to create pages that look good on any device and provide a seamless user experience. Check for fast loading time. Consider optimizing your splash page loading time because it can become the reason for potential clients to leave. You should use compressed images and minimize scripts to ensure users don’t have to wait to explore your message. Conduct A/B testing. Try multiple splash page versions that suit your main purpose and target audience’s needs. Consider implementing A/B testing to find the perfect combination of visuals, messaging, and CTAs. By trying several options, you’ll be able to identify elements that work best with your audience. Now that you have a step-by-step guide on creating an effective splash page, let’s explore some tips to grab attention and encourage site visitors to action. 8 Splash Page Tips In this section, you’ll find a list of tips that will help you develop a clear and attention-grabbing slash page. So let’s dive in. Keep it action-oriented. To reach the primary goals of your splash page, you need to make it action-orientated. Consider including all the elements necessary for users to complete the desired action. It can be a visible CTA, concise message, and visuals that entice site visitors to subscribe to your email newsletter, search for items, or purchase with a discount code. Use a countdown timer. Countdown timers are perfect for limited-time promotions, sales, and exclusive offers. They establish a sense of urgency and encourage users to take action as soon as possible. The fear of missing out helps you reach the business goals you want to achieve through your splash page faster. Be consistent. The elements and language of your splash page should align with your overall brand tone and messaging style. You need to be consistent across all your channels to establish recognition. In addition to language and messaging, your visuals, color scheme, and fonts should also comply with your branding guidelines. Entice subscribers with special offers. Exclusive deals, discounts, and offers allow you to attract prospects’ attention and encourage them to complete the desired action. It will help you increase your customer base and improve conversions. Add a skip option. Your splash page should allow site visitors to skip this standalone page and proceed to the primary content of your website. It will help you improve user experience and ensure that site visitors get the necessary information immediately and complete the actions they strive for. Add a clear CTA. Since every splash page has a specific goal, you should ensure users can help you reach it. They complete the necessary actions by clicking the call to action button. That’s why you need to create a splash page that has a clear, visible, and concise CTA. It will enable your potential customers to proceed to your offers, events, language and country settings, and other aspects that help you attain your business objectives. Utilize analytics. If you want to have a clear understanding of your splash page performance, it’s crucial to apply analytics tools. They will help you uncover whether your splash page resonates with your target audience and brings valuable results. After receiving insights into your splash page, you can craft it based on customer preferences, interests, and overall activity on your site. Add a concise message. Your message should be brief to communicate the main idea behind your splash page. With a short and sweet message, you’ll be able to grab attention and encourage users to explore your content further. Support your message with visuals to interest site visitors and make them discover more information about your brand. Now that you know the best practices, let’s discover some excellent splash page examples. They will inspire you to create a splash page that encourages action. Splash Page Examples You can find numerous examples of splash pages widely used by brands. In this section, we’ll provide some successful examples to inspire you. Fighting Pretty Fighting Pretty, an NGO established to support women during their cancer treatments, incorporates a splash page to encourage new users to join the community. This non-governmental organization shows new site visitors a short and to-the-point message, participants’ image, and a visible and clear call to action button. This splash page matches the organization’s color scheme, fonts, and style, aligning it with the primary website. Zara Zara, the famous clothing brand, is an excellent example of the right usage of splash pages. When you proceed to the company’s website, you’ll instantly see a page full of visually appealing visuals and the opportunity to choose country and language preferences. This splash page aims to ensure the best user experience for site visitors, allowing them to explore items in their language, currency, and delivery options. CB Creative Blog When users open the CB Creative Blog website, the first thing they see is a splash page. The company offers potential subscribers to explore daily design news, reviews, and how-tos once they sign up for its email newsletter. The main purpose of this splash page is to increase the number of contacts on the mailing list. The page’s message is short and clear. After reading the main message, site visitors can share their emails and take the desired action by clicking on a call to action button. Congrats, now you know what a splash page is and why it’s useful for your company. Hope that our guide, tips, and examples will help you create an effective splash page that grabs attention and allows you to reach the desired goals.

Strategic planning is setting up a company's long-term goals and defining the ways to reach them. It helps highlight a brand’s priorities and create a roadmap for future development. In the article, we explain what strategic planning is and why it is vital, and describe its benefits and models. We also provide the steps to help you develop a strategic plan that will boost your company in the market. Why is strategic planning important? Cascade states that business leaders in 49% of organizations spend only one day a month analyzing how they implement their strategy. Such an attitude may badly influence their companies’ success because strategic planning requires more effort to be effective. Discover why it is vital for your business’ success. Strategic planning helps you define a clear mission and direction in which you want to move your brand. You can use them as a guideline to align your everyday decisions with the business’s main goal. It lets companies reach their objectives faster and manage time wisely. Also, this process influences your staff’s motivation positively. When your employees have a clear vision of the company’s future, they feel more inspired to work hard and reach the goal as fast as possible. Moreover, it gives them a better understanding of the company's processes and makes communication between employees and the employer more productive. Finally, strategic planning lets you evaluate the efficiency of your work and improve the roadblocks immediately. You can use the strategy as a benchmark to discover the issues with your company’s development. This is the reason to revise it regularly and track your business performance in an ever-changing market. Now you understand why strategic planning is so essential. Continue reading to discover the main benefits of this process. 4 Benefits of Strategic Planning It is difficult to overrate the importance of a strong strategy for long-term company development. We explain the main benefits of strategic planning and how they influence your brand’s performance below. Measurable goals and easy progress evaluation. A clear strategy should include specific and concrete objectives you will use as guidelines for future decisions. They help align the brand’s efforts with pre-set goals to reach them faster. Also, it is easier for companies to measure the effectiveness of their activities. A strategic plan gives a sense of direction and lets business owners make adjustments to the current strategy to optimize business performance. Better staff motivation. According to Harvard Business School, 95% of employees do not understand or are unaware of the company’s current strategy. It is one of the reasons why brands fail in their implementation. However, when your managers understand the direction your company moves, it inspires them to work better and be more creative. Employees understand the link between their performance and compensation, so they try to work more productively. Effective crisis management. Strong strategies make businesses more durable and resistant to market changes. The planning process lets companies evaluate possible roadblocks and weaknesses and prevent them before they influence their performance. It helps save time and resources necessary to overcome problems if they occur. Increased profitability. According to Balance Marketing Group, brands that use strategic plans are 12% more profitable. It happens due to effective crisis management, more goal-oriented actions, and higher employee motivation. A strong strategy gives you a competitive advantage and helps turn all company’s efforts into the best results to increase revenue and market share. Understanding all these benefits motivates many business owners to build strategic plans for their companies. Find out the models you can use in the next section. 10 Strategic Planning Models There are many ways to create your strategy and plan a brand's development. Some models appeal to small businesses, some to huge companies, and some are universal. We'll review the peculiarities of the most widespread models below. The basic model is rather simple and ideal for small businesses and startups. The first step is to define the brand's mission, values, and goals. Then you should highlight the ways to reach these objectives and create an action plan that will serve you as a roadmap. Finally, this model requires continuous tracking and optimizing the strategy to improve the results. SWOT analysis is necessary to define the advantages and disadvantages of your current strategy. It is an acronym that means ‘strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.’ You can use SWOT analysis to optimize the company’s processes. Raise the success of your performance by solving problems and empowering the strengths of your company. An issue-based model uses SWOT analysis as a framework to build more complex strategies. Marketers identify the most appealing scenarios and develop action plans to overcome possible issues. Then, companies allocate resources to turn these strategies into reality and optimize them constantly to improve their effectiveness. The PEST model is similar to the SWOT analysis, but it focuses on external factors. This acronym means ‘political, economic, sociocultural, and technological.’ All these factors can influence your company’s health and performance, so it is vital to evaluate them and find the possible issues. Build a plan and solve them to strengthen your company. You may also expand this model and use the PESTLE acronym to include legal and environmental factors in your study. The scenario model is useful if many external factors influence your company’s performance. It involves studying various market elements, such as competition, trends, changes in consumer behavior, etc., evaluating their effect on your strategy, and creating from 2 to 5 possible scenarios for future development. You should build the most appealing and worst scenarios one suggest ways to overcome problems. A strategy map is a diagram that shows the logical connections between the situations that may occur and the company's actions. It is better to combine this visual tool with other models, such as basic, issue-based, or scenario one. A well-defined map lets you create a clear vision of your business goals and how you are going to reach them, unify all the data in one strategy and discover how market elements affect each other and influence your brand’s development. Porter’s Five Forces model evaluates the influence of the most important external factors on your company. They include the threat of entry to your marketplace, the threat of substituting your products, the bargaining powers of consumers and suppliers, and the existing competition. You should examine all these factors, determine how they will influence your strategy, and suggest ways to reduce their impact and optimize the company's performance. The VRIO model can be a framework to strengthen your existing strategy. Marketers use it to identify the competitive advantages of their products. VRIO is an acronym for ‘value, rarity, imitability, and organization.’ You should examine these qualities of your products, identify the strongest ones, and highlight them in future promotional campaigns to stand out from the competitors. If you also discover the weak elements of your strategy, improve them and make your product even more appealing. An organic model focuses on the brand’s values and is based on the self-organization of people who have the same goal. It includes three main steps. Firstly, you identify the company's values and vision of its future development together with your team. Secondly, all employees create personal action plans on what they will do to reach the main goal. Finally, all workers take responsibility for turning this plan into reality and report on the progress. An alignment model aims to structure the important perspectives of business development. You need to examine and evaluate technology and competitive potential, the service level, and the strategy that drives your company’s performance. Ideally, if all these factors work together and empower each other. If there is some discrepancy between them, you will discover what to improve to strengthen your strategy implementation. Besides the fact that these models are rather different, the main steps in planning your company’s performance are similar. Continue reading to discover how to build a strong strategy to boost your company on the market. 5 Strategic Planning Steps According to The Economist, 39% of brands state that one of the main reasons for their success is the skilled implementation of pre-built plans. Find out the main steps to create an effective strategy and implement it accurately. Define your mission and values. This step is required to identify the direction you want to move to. Also, a clear understanding of your mission and values lets you align your actions with the messages you want to transmit. Identify how you want to influence consumers’ lives and what experiences you want to provide. Study your existing position. You can use SWOT or PEST analysis to create a holistic image of the current situation in the company. Collect data about consumers, study your competitors and analyze internal factors that influence your sales. Then define your strengths and weaknesses. As a result, you will understand what aspects of your market performance you should focus on. Set measurable goals. It may be difficult for you to work with a few objectives at once, so it is better to prioritize them. You may set SMART goals, which should be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timely. Such an attitude lets you manage and achieve them easier. Remember that also your goals should correspond with the mission and values you have defined before. Use one of the planning models and create a future strategy. It is time to build a step-by-step plan to reach your objectives. Focus on the initiatives that strengthen your long-term position. You can mix a few planning models to create a more complex strategy. Define possible scenarios and identify how you will react to the market changes to prevent potential issues. Implement and optimize your strategy. Determine the resources you need to turn your plan into reality. Measurable pre-set goals will let you analyze your strategy and identify the roadblocks quickly. You may also need to reevaluate the current plan after a certain time to optimize it and make it even more effective. Remember that your strategy should be flexible, so update it regularly. Congrats, now you know what strategic planning is and why it is important, understand its benefits and models. You can also build a strategy for your company to optimize its performance and raise profits.

Storytelling is using a narrative to encourage people’s imagination, transmit certain messages and motivate the audience to take action. Marketers use storytelling to increase consumers’ brand loyalty and inspire them to buy a company’s products. In the video below, Alex reveals the mystery of the art of storytelling. Get inspired! In the article, we explain what storytelling is and why it is essential, and describe its types and effective techniques. We also define the elements necessary for a good story and provide examples of amazing storytelling. Why is storytelling important? According to Search Engine Watch, 62% of B2B marketers are sure that storytelling is a powerful tool in their content marketing strategy. We explain why it is so important and how it can boost your company below. Firstly, stories help companies draw consumers' attention. They engage people and, in such a way, raise their interest in your brand and increase brand awareness. You can tell stories on different platforms: from TV advertisements to social media posts, from podcasts to video projects. It helps attract more buyers to your brand, especially if the story becomes viral. Secondly, compelling stories resonate with consumers’ feelings and evoke certain emotions. It allows companies to show people that they share their pains and needs. In such a way, you can humanize your brand, give buyers a sense of community, make them empathize with your company, and foster their loyalty. Thirdly, powerful storytelling adds value to your products and helps sell them better. When people are engaged in your stories, they are more likely to stay with your company and become regular clients. Increasing customer lifetime value lets businesses drive more revenue because existing clients spend 31% more money than new ones. Finally, storytelling is a great way to explain complicated things simply. Some companies promote concepts and developments that are difficult to understand for consumers. The best way to persuade people to buy these products is to connect them with simple ideas and feelings relevant to everyone. You can show how cutting-edge goods can improve people’s lives to raise their interest. Now you understand how stories influence consumers’ behavior and help companies in their product promotion. Continue reading to discover the elements that help create an effective story. What makes a good story? Consumers consider the story interesting when it tells about something important and relevant to them. However, it is not enough to make your storytelling engaging. Discover more on what creates a really good story in this section. Central message and plot. Define the main idea of the story you tell. It should be a strong morality that influences the listeners’ emotions and reminds them about the importance of certain things. Once you define this core message, build a plot around it. Your story needs a beginning, climax, and end. Remember that all these elements should be connected and describe the central message. Conflict. It is impossible to create an engaging story without tension. You can combine internal and external conflicts to keep people on edge and motivate them to listen till the end. Describe the challenges your characters face while trying to reach their goals. It helps evoke the audience's feelings and connect consumers with your brand through powerful experiences. Characters. Memorable personalities are one more necessary element in a good story. All characters should have their own goals, motivations, voices, strengths, weaknesses, challenges, and the ways they overcome them. Appearance is also very important. It should coincide with the inner world of the characters and distinguish them from each other. Remember that all personalities should play a certain role in the story and influence the plot. Setting. Choose remarkable places that coincide with your characters’ personalities and help the plot develop. The setting should reflect the atmosphere of your story. For example, if the plot is mysterious — you can choose dark and strange places; if it is funny — the setting can be bright and attractive. Rhythm and structure. To keep listeners engaged, you should change the rhythm of the story. Mix long and short sentences, paragraphs, or scenes. Avoid monotonous narration. Also, your story should have a clear structure. It does not matter whether you tell the story orally, in writing, using visual elements, or even through play — a clear beginning, middle, and end of the plot are required. They should work together to transmit the central message of the story. The ending. The listeners need to have a clear understanding of the story’s resolution. It should not necessarily be a good one, but it should reflect the main idea of the plot. If you use storytelling in marketing, it is good to use a call to action at the end of the narrative. In such a way, you give the audience instructions about their future actions and come to the logical end of the story. Understanding these elements can help you create powerful stories to influence your audiences’ buying decisions. Let’s go further and discover the main types of storytelling and how to use them in marketing. 4 Types of Storytelling Now storytelling is not only a way to entertain but a powerful tool in brands’ promotion. To use it in marketing effectively, you need to know the main types of storytelling. Oral storytelling. It is the oldest form of storytelling that plays a vital role in the cultural traditions of many countries. Singing songs, telling stories, and reciting poetry in front of the audience were the first forms of oral storytelling. Now it is still alive and continues to develop. For example, we can observe oral storytelling on the radio or podcasts. Also, people tell jokes or stories from their lives on social media, such as TikTok or Instagram, creating a mix of digital and oral storytelling. Written storytelling. It is one of the most popular forms of telling stories. Books, newspapers, magazines, banners, etc. are examples of written storytelling. People read them for entertainment, education, and discovering something new, so marketers often use this form of storytelling to promote companies and products. There are also many written stories on the Internet, which means that this type of storytelling mixes with the digital one. Visual storytelling. Paintings and drawings have been a part of human culture for years. Now the term ‘visual storytelling’ is much wider. Movies, serials, photos, videos, infographics, animations, and memes are only a few ways of telling stories. Companies often use visual storytelling in their marketing campaigns. You can watch ads on TV or discover the brand’s story through its photos on social media. We can also mix this form of storytelling with the digital one. Digital storytelling. The newest way of telling stories conveys all the previous forms through the Internet. Content marketing is a way to promote companies on the world wide web. Brands can use photos, videos, articles, blogs, audio recordings, etc., or combine them and create more complicated forms of storytelling. Also, the Internet lets developers use games and tell their stories through play. This way of storytelling turns people who passively receive the data into active creators and makes them more engaged in the story than anytime before. Now you know 4 types of storytelling and how to use them in marketing. Continue reading to discover effective techniques that can help you increase the effectiveness of your stories. 5 Effective Storytelling Techniques According to the research by a professor at Stanford University, stories are the most effective way to deliver data. When his students heard a speech that included storytelling and facts, 63% remembered the stories and only 5% remembered individual statistics. This fact proves the ultimate power of storytelling. Discover how to increase its effectiveness even more in this section. Show what happens and use scene-by-scene construction. This tactic is the most effective in written storytelling. Instead of telling about the events, you should describe them. Transport the audience to the scene, and make them hear and feel the same as your characters do. It can help you immerse the readers into your story, engage them and influence their perceptions. Avoid missing some scenes and telling about them afterward. Remember that it is always better to show something than to state the fact of an event. Make the story dynamic and easy to relate to. To engage the audience, you should evoke people’s emotions and feelings that are easy to understand. Don’t be afraid to show your or brand’s weaknesses and the ways you overcome them. Such elements make your storytelling more personal and especially captivating. However, you should avoid irrelevant details that do not boost the plot or influence your characters to keep consumers’ attention all the time. Define a hero and an enemy. Strong characters are one of the most important elements of the story. People always need someone they will support and someone they will hate. Sometimes bad characters can be things, natural phenomena, or events that do not let positive ones reach their goals. The climax of the story is the biggest fight between the enemy and the hero. Create a feeling of suspense and add unexpected events. It is also about continuous tensions that keep readers’ or listeners’ attention. You can create a non-linear storyline and start from the middle action or from the climax to hook the audience at once. Add surprises to your plot that keep conflict intensivе, make the audience empathize with the characters, and create a memorable story. Improve your dialogues. It is one of the most challenging parts of the stories to write. Note that your characters should sound realistic and individual and stay consistent in their voices and communicational styles. Also, do not use dialogues if they don’t serve the development of the plot. Some changes in the characters’ personalities or actions should happen after every communication. Remember these techniques to create strong stories that you can use in your company’s blogs, social media, or during promotional campaigns. In the next section, we provide examples of brands that used effective storytelling to boost their company. Storytelling Examples To use storytelling for brand promotion, your stories should be interesting, engaging, and persuasive. Moreover, they should appeal to your audience and coincide with the company’s values. Below we provide examples of effective storytelling from well-known companies and highlight the peculiarities that made them so powerful. Disney ‘The Little Duck’ is a commercial by Disney that tells us a story about how dreams come true. In the video, we see a duckling who finds a comic book about Donald Duck. He likes the story and becomes infatuated with the main character. However, the bad weather makes his family to fly away, so the duckling leaves a comix. They have been flying all night and, eventually, find a new home. The little duck realizes that they are in Disneyland Paris and meets his hero Donald Duck in real life. This cute story is an amazing advertisement for Disney’s amusement park. In 75 seconds, we become completely fascinated by the character's fate and feel happy when the video ends well. Eva Stories It is not a promotional campaign, but Eva Stories is an amazing example of storytelling witha critical social mission. A story describes the last days of 13-year-old Hungarian Jew girl Eva who lived in 1944. Conducted on Instagram Stories, the campaign aims to educate people about what happened during the Holocaust. It is based on the real diary belonging to Eva Heyman, who died at Auschwitz on October 17, 1944. Below is a screenshot of Eva's Instagram, which has more than one million followers. There are stories from February 13 to March 31 that depict her life before and after Germany’s invasion of Hungary. They had 300 million views in less than 48 hours and made many people worry and feel sad about the events of the Holocaust that ruined so many lives. Coca-Cola This company conducted a campaign using AR technologies to tell short stories connected with their brand. Buyers could point their phone’s cameras at Coca-Cola’s can to see small characters on the screen. There were 12 short stories; each one had a conflict and a positive resolution. In the end, the characters shared a can of Cola and had fun. There is a video about the creation of this storytelling campaign. The company aimed to attract consumers’ attention to their products using new technologies and interactive promotions. As a result, the combination of augmented reality and storytelling was extremely successful and became one of the most unusual advertising campaigns in the brand’s history. Apple The director Michael Gondry created the film ‘Detour’ as a part of a promotional campaign for the iPhone 7 Plus. It aimed to show the quality of Apple’s camera and its features, such as animation, filming underwater, time-lapse and slow motion. The company also provided additional online masterclasses to explain to buyers how to create such amazing videos. ‘Detour’ tells us a story about a tricycle that a family lost during their journey. The girl who owned it was very upset, but the story had a happy ending. You can observe the adventures of the tricycle and its young owner for 11 minutes and, finally, feel happy about the unexpected outcome of the story. Congrats, now you know what storytelling is and why it is important, understand the distinctive features of a good story and techniques for powerful storytelling. Also, you have discovered inspiring examples from popular brands that can motivate you to use stories for your company’s promotion.

A squeeze page is a web page made for capturing potential customers’ email addresses. It’s a common practice for these pages to offer free ebooks, educational emails, videos, and more, in exchange for a visitor’s email address or other data. At first sight, squeeze pages resemble landing pages, but they’re slightly different. What is the difference between a squeeze page and a landing page? In short, a squeeze page is a specific type of landing page; it’s made for one purpose – to collect users' email addresses. Apart from that, landing pages can aim at selling a product or service. Typically, squeeze pages are shorter than landing pages. They contain a minimal amount of graphics, details, and additional information. Their task is to start a buyer's journey while landing pages work at different stages of the sales funnel. A squeeze page can provide you with valuable leads. To nail it, optimize the page’s conversion rate from the beginning. Let’s unpack the several ways to compile a high-converting squeeze page. As squeeze pages resemble landing pages, you can use some tips on building the latter as the foundation of your squeeze page. Our guide on boosting landing page conversions will come in handy. To deepen your knowledge of what makes a good squeeze page, read on to learn more about the best practices. How to Create a High-Converting Squeeze Page Define the Right Target Audience Build an Appealing Offer Create a Killer Headline Think up a Great Design Create a Сlear Сall to Action To leverage a good conversion rate, learn how to compose your squeeze page. We’ve picked five marketing, design, and copywriting tips to help you get started with your highly-converting page. Define the Right Target Audience To hook and retain your squeeze page visitors, you need to spot your audience precisely. Don’t content yourself with vague characteristics, such as “30-year-old women.” Find out your audience’s values, interests, and goals. You can extract more information from your customer profile. If you don’t have one, check our guide on compiling a buyer persona. Address your visitors' pain points and interests, as Mindflash did in the example below. The company clearly stated its target audience – people eager to launch a training program. Moreover, Mindflash stressed the main advantage of their proposal. It helps customers build an effective program and keep the cost down. Build an Appealing Offer The key to success with a squeeze page is including a relevant and irresistible offer to your target audience. Usually, it is a lead magnet – PDF, report, checklist, or other types of useful downloadable content. It might be tempting to give your visitors a monumental piece of content. But, don’t overdo it so as not to scare your audience away. Enormous books are intimidating; barely anyone got the whole way through War and Peace for this reason. Give your audience something concise but valuable, as Incomediary does. The blog went for a compilation of 110 headlines that helped attract readers. This ebook is short and easy-to-use – just copy and paste the headlines. Create a Killer Headline By the way, take care of your squeeze page’s headline and supporting headings as well. These parts of any web page draw immediate user attention and can make or break further reading. Here’re some tips on how to compose a headline that hooks attention: Address your reader’s pain points and offer a solution – your product. Indicate the product you are offering from the beginning. List the benefits a reader will get with your product, such as a conversion rate increase. Add figures – they’re clear-cut indicators of value. Your supporting headings should relate to your headline perfectly. Otherwise, the whole work will fall flat, because it will confuse readers. Look at the A+ squeeze page Fisher Investments provides. In the headline, the company addresses its audience’s fears of financial hardship. The supporting heading kills two birds with one stone; it gets to the bottom of the offer and highlights the simplicity of using this guide (just 15 minutes to read!). Think up a Great Design It takes a visitor only 50 milliseconds to decide whether a squeeze page is worth staying on or not. The page’s design is a golden opportunity to attract more readers and boost your conversion rate. To create a stunning squeeze page, pay special attention to its structure; it should be crisp, airy, and easy to skim. Give some thought to color psychology; think of the association you want to create with your product and go for a matching shade. Finally, pick up the perfect visuals; images should be relevant, eye-catching, and high-quality. Here is an example from Fathom. To promote their travel guide, the company chose a background image with palm trees and a turquoise sea. This shot resembles the cover of the eBook on offer. The squeeze page has enough space between all the elements and looks airy. The color palette is unified and harmonic. Create a Сlear Сall to Action A call to action is a milestone for a high-converting squeeze page. Pay attention both to the design and the copy of your CTA button. For the visual part, use vibrant and contrasting colors and make sure the button is big enough for both desktop and mobile users to easily engage with. Leave some space around it and choose the right location (the best place is in the top left corner). To drive conversions with the copy, go for a single clear-cut call to action. Pages with only one call to action convert 3% better than those with five or more links. To reinforce the message, use imperatives, such as “click” or “subscribe”. The lead generation service, Carrot, knows a thing or two about good calls to action. The CTA button is the same color as the bottom of the eBook cover; it creates symmetry and catches the viewer’s attention. The copy also works well being clear, imperative, and urgent by using the word “now.” 5 Squeeze Page Best Practices Go for Minimal Form Fields Use Multi-Channel Forms Make the Benefits Visible Include Social Proof Add Visuals Effectively Practice makes perfect, so we’ve found five best practices brands stick to with their squeeze pages. We’ve also added some tips on implementing them into your strategy. Go for Minimal Form Fields You probably hate seeing the subscription forms with 5+ fields to fill in; so do your visitors. To get the maximum number of leads, minimize the number of form fields. The best option is to only ask for an email address or name and email address. If you want to segment leads from a squeeze page, the email field alone is not enough. Give multi-step forms a shot. In other words, long forms split up into several pieces. Look at the example of such a form below. At first, a viewer only sees a button and gets access to the form with five fields after a click. Thus, the process looks less intimidating, and a user is less likely to quit. Use Multi-Channel Forms Our inboxes are overloaded. That makes it more difficult for your message to reach subscribers. Moreover, some users hardly ever use emails and spend most of their time on social media or messaging apps. The solution? Applying multi-channel forms. They allow visitors to subscribe with their email, messenger, or social media account. To build beautiful, responsive, and adjustable multi-channel forms, try LIKE.TG. Below is an example of how it may look like. We’ve customized the form design and incorporated the buttons to subscribe to email and our Facebook and Telegram chatbots. Sign up with LIKE.TG and create as many forms as you like for free. Make the Benefits Visible It’s a good idea to list the advantages of your offer; this trick helps visitors make a decision. It’s even better to make these benefits more evident with icons, infographics, or images. If your squeeze page offers a modest eBook or a newsletter, use icons instead. Make each of them unique and relevant to the advantage they illustrate. For a dose of inspiration, check out Skyeng's example. The company highlights the benefits of its product with custom pictures and screenshots. Include Social Proof Social proof increases the credibility of your offer and the conversion rate as well. For instance, products with over 50 reviews have a 4.6% increase in conversion rates. It's an overwhelming amount for a squeeze page. However, even a couple of testimonials can make a difference. To get your head around applying social proofs, consider following Backlinko's example. The company includes reviews both on the newsletter and the service itself. Moreover, Backlinko added the logos of media resources that have featured the brand. Add Visuals Effectively Visual content drives 84% more views and 94% more clicks than the text-only content. Thus, using visuals is a golden opportunity to boost your squeeze page views and conversion rate. To leverage it, the visuals should be relevant, high-quality, and attention-grabbing. So, a win-win decision is to add product images, a guide, or an eBook to your offer. Look at this example from Webprofits. The company applied quality images to their guide, which looks like a new beautiful paper book. If you want to go for something a little more creative, try adding a short video to your squeeze page. 83% of marketers say video content has helped them generate leads. You can apply a short overview of your product, reviews from happy customers, creative videos, and so on. Eager for more practical information? Read and check out some more examples of a few squeeze pages we’ve picked for you. 4 Squeeze Page Examples Examples are inspirational and helpful; they allow us to borrow the best and avoid the worst in our own approach. Let’s learn what other brands do right on their squeeze pages and what can be improved. Pipedrive The software company, Pipedrive, shows a classic example of a well-made squeeze page. Offering free instructional emails, Pipedrive highlights its advantages. Its minimal sharp design works well for this page. The company uses three colors, which makes the green CTA button stand out. The copy is concise yet persuasive. The subscription form is simple, which works best for a squeeze page. The best part of this page is that it includes social proof. Pipedrive added reviews from real people with their photos and occupations. This move makes the credibility of the product skyrocket. To reinforce this effect, the company shows the number of course subscribers. Rosetta Stone The education technology service, Rosetta Stone, knows a thing or two about using visuals. The company chose vibrant colors for the squeeze page in the example below. Better yet, it uses animated images of its product – the language learning app. This way, Rosetta Stone kills two birds with one stone; it shows the product and stresses the benefits of using it for the audience. The work with social proof is excellent as well. The company subtly interweaves reviews, clients’ logos, and statistics into its squeeze page. The page may seem a bit overloaded, especially contrasting with the previous example. Nevertheless, the CTA buttons are noticeable. Although there is some space for improvement, the copy works well. Summit in a box The virtual summit system, Summit in a Box, nails its squeeze page with an appealing offer. The company provides subscribers with a marketing plan for their summit. The eBook includes instructions on email and social media promotion for webinar coordinators and speakers. This guide looks so easy-to-apply and handy, that you instantly want to get it. Summit in a Box seems to cut corners with this copy; it needs a sharper structure. The benefits of the eBook would look better as a bulleted list. The visual part of the page is easy-on-the-eyes. The image of the product is nice, and the background doesn’t make the copy illegible. The CTA button is eye-catching, and the form is concise. TapInfluence Influencer marketing service, TapInfluence, has staked almost everything on a sophisticated design. The company went for a flashy header on its squeeze page. One half of it shows the eBook the service offers, and the other reflects a part of the cover. The CTA button is visible, although it’s not so bright. TapInfluence could have reduced the number of fields or gone for a multi-part form. Nevertheless, the subscription process doesn’t look intimidating. Another advantage of this page is its copy. It starts with addressing the audience’s pain points and offering a solution – the eBook. Further, you can see a brief description of the guide’s content and the list of benefits you can get from it. We have unpacked a few hacks and examples of creating high-converting squeeze pages. To maintain communication with leads from them, consider email marketing, or reinforce your lead strategy with SMS, messenger chatbots, and web push notifications. Sign up with LIKE.TG to benefit from implementing these tools into your marketing strategy.

A straight rebuy is a buying situation where a company reorders the same products in the same quantity from the same supplier. In this purchasing situation, buyers are likely to skip researching suppliers and products since they have previously ordered from this specific vendor. What is the difference between a straight rebuy and a modified rebuy? Purchasing situations vary and can change when the market changes. Let’s break them down into three types: new buy; straight rebuy; modified rebuy. New buy A new buy, also called a new task, is a buying situation in which a company places an order with a supplier for the first time. This purchasing type takes longer since you need to conduct in-depth research and analysis on products from various suppliers to make the right decision. Straight rebuy This means that an individual or a company only needs to reorder from the same vendor without changing any of its elements. In this buying situation, a company expects the order to be on time since the supplier already knows the details and can plan production. There shouldn’t be any confusion or misunderstandings between a supplier and the company that orders products because of their previous collaboration. To keep loyal customers, suppliers should maintain product and service quality and automate their reordering systems to save clients’ time. Additionally, they can offer new products and services to capture more markets. Manufacturers prefer this buying situation because the client doesn’t consider alternative suppliers to buy from. As a result, they have a stable constant revenue stream. Modified rebuy This means that a company wants to reorder but needs to modify some elements of their previous orders. The change can be in terms of the supplier, delivery time, packaging, price, quality, or quantity. This modification can result in delayed order delivery because the supplier has to change it. Sometimes it can be time-consuming. In some cases, a modified rebuy can cause the wrong supply of goods to the clients. Also, it can require research to find a good supplier or to make changes to an order. As you can see, these purchasing types have several differences and are used in different situations between your company and a supplier during the reordering process. Now that you know the difference, let’s walk you through the examples. Examples of a Straight Rebuy Dunkin' Donuts and Blue Diamond Growers Starbucks Boeing and King Aerospace Aircraft Support Services Here you can find several examples of a straight rebuy to see the process in action. Dunkin' Donuts and Blue Diamond Growers In 2014, the multinational coffee and donut company introduced almond milk at most of its restaurants. This is a plant-based alternative for vegans or people who don’t consume dairy products. So the brand needed a regular supplier of milk for their new product. Blue Diamond Growers has supplied almond milk to Dunkin’ Donuts since 2014 when its product was first introduced to guests of the famous donut brand. Starbucks This corporation is known worldwide as the largest coffeehouse chain. The brand entered Southeast Asia a long time ago, and today it sources a great amount of arabica coffee beans from Indonesia (Sumatra), the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam, Latin America, etc. So, it has regular suppliers located in the United States, Singapore, Hong Kong, Mexico, Indonesia, India, etc. Boeing and King Aerospace Aircraft Support Services In 2019, Boeing, the manufacturer of airplanes mentioned King Aerospace among 10 companies-suppliers of the year that create and supply high-quality products, services, and value for Boeing and its clients. The company expressed gratitude for collaboration that aimed at innovation, process, or product improvement. Companies can find themselves in different types of buying situations based on the products they want to buy, the information they have, timeframe, etc. A straight rebuy is the most simple buying situation as a company purchases from an approved supplier. The examples above demonstrate this type of purchase in action.

A/B testing was invented to predict the metrics of your mailings. A/B testing allows you to compare elements of your postings and use the more effective variants with the highest delivery rates, open rates, and clicks through. There are many elements of your email campaignthat you can test, including: the email subject; the sender’s data; the preheader; the location of the text box; the heading settings, such as the font and the size; the main text settings, such as the font and the size; the calls to action, and their number and location; the number of photos in the emails; using animated pictures like GIFs and videos; the number of links. For example, imagine you have two subject lines— "Gift for you!" and "We’ve got something interesting for you!" — but you don't know which one to use as you don't know which one will work best. In this situation, you should test them. While conducting the A/B test, LIKE.TG will create two different mailings with two different subject lines. In the A/B test, you should define the "Choice Criterion," which determines the "winner" variant of the mailings. In our option, the choice criterion is the open rate. When testing the subject line, this is more suitable than clicks through. Email “A” will be sent to 20% of your address book, as will email “B.” When the results are available, send the “winning” email to the remaining 60% of recipients. That is how you can increase the metric measurements of your newsletterswith the help of A/B testing. You can follow this guide to conduct an A/B test for your email campaign.

A startup is a young company established by one or more entrepreneurs to create unique and irreplaceable products or services. It aims at bringing innovation and building ideas quickly. In this video below,Alex shares 5 tips you need to know to run a successful startup. Check it out! In this article, we’ll uncover the types of startups and startup business ideas, explore the reasons to work in a startup, and provide a few steps to build a startup from scratch. 6Types of Startups Scalable startups Small business startups Lifestyle startups Buyable startups Big business startups Social startups In our modern world, where everyone strives to bring innovation, a good idea isn’t enough to create a startup. To understand the features of different startups better, you need to review the following six types. Scalable startups. Companies in a tech niche often belong to this group. Since technology companies often have great potential, they can easily access the global market. Tech businesses can receive financial support from investors and grow into international companies. Examples of such startups include Google, Uber, Facebook, and Twitter. These startups hire the best workers and search for investors to boost the development of their ideas and scale. Small business startups. These businesses are created by regular people and are self-funded. They grow at their own pace and usually have a good site but don’t have an app. Grocery stores, hairdressers, bakers, and travel agents are the perfect examples. Lifestyle startups. People who have hobbies and are eager to work on their passion can create a lifestyle startup. They can make a living by doing what they love. We can see a lot of examples of lifestyle startups. Let’s take dancers, for instance. They actively open online dance schools to teach children and adults to dance and earn money this way. Buyable startups. In the technology and software industry, some people design a startup from scratch to sell it to a bigger company later. Giants like Amazon and Uber buy small startups to develop them over time and receive benefits. Big business startups. Large companies have a finite lifespan since customers’ preferences, technologies, and competitors change over time. That’s why businesses should be ready to adapt to new conditions. As a result, they design innovative products that can satisfy the needs of modern customers. Social startups. These startups exist despite the general belief that the main aim of all startups is to earn money. There are still companies designed to do good for other people, and they are called social startups. Examples include charities and non-profit organizations that exist thanks to donations. For instance, Code.org, a non-profit organization, encourages school students in the US to learn computer science. If you consider creating your startup, we’ve prepared five startup business ideas that will inspire you to develop something unique. 5Startup Business Ideas Create an online grocery delivery service Start a podcast Develop a dropshipping business Create an online language learning app or site Consider developing a blog Before diving into one of the ideas on our list, you should define whether there’s a demand for the startup idea you want to begin with. Consider researching your market first so that you can analyze the demand, supply, and what customers need. Create an online grocery delivery service Nowadays, grocery delivery is a great business idea to get started with. To begin, you only need to have minimal setup costs, a vehicle, and a phone. People often have no time to shop offline for some reason. An online grocery delivery service is an excellent solution you can offer. It will provide your customers with all the necessary products at any time. Consider cooperating with local grocery stores to provide your clients with the best quality and a wider variety of products. One of the examples is Instacart, an app that allows users to pick up products and deliver them fast. Start a podcast If you have profound knowledge or specialization in a particular field, you can create a podcast. The audience will appreciate your consistent, valuable, and relevant content. The main advantage of podcasts is that there’s no point worrying about your target audiencebeing busy offline when you make your sales pitch. Great podcasts deliver expert information, build relationships with the listeners, and eliminate costs on other communication channels. Let’s take The Birth Hour, for example. The podcast’s hosts share different birth stories and pieces of advice for future moms. Develop a dropshipping business This idea is especially enticing since you don’t need to buy inventory upfront. Doing a competitive analysis will allow you to sell higher-end products with low shipping costs and obtain good profits. For example, Mooshe Socks, a small socks shop, does just that. Create an online learning app or website If you are good at teaching, you can start an online course. It can be anything: dance classes, yoga, meditations, or languages. By doing this, you can bring value to your students and share your knowledge with them. One of the great examples is Duolingo. The website enables people to learn foreign languages and take courses to increase and check their language proficiency. Consider developing a blog The world is changing, and it’s no secret that bloggers earn more than large business owners. Opinion leaders can make money by placing ads, writing sponsored posts, hosting webinars, providing readers with services, and offering ad space. That’s why there’s a point in creating breathtaking articles, videos, and stories on your website or social media platforms. Choose an industry you are interested in and create stories that will amaze your readers. It can be a blog about beauty, health, fashion, traveling, or sport. For instance, Greatist, a fitness and health Internet media startup, managed to gain the trust of many young people. If you aren’t ready to start your own business, joining a startup company and obtaining valuable experience is a good idea. 6Reasons to Work in a Startup Startups open the door not to a to-do list but rather to new possibilities and challenges that will let you grow with it. Let’s jump to the main reasons to join a startup. Flexible schedule. For sure, you’ll have a lot of work to do, but you can schedule the tasks according to your own comfort. You just need to negotiate it with your boss. One more advantage is that you can work remotely from any part of the world. The only thing you need is a good Internet connection. Variety of tasks. The opportunities and challenges you will face during your work in a startup will constantly change. This means that you will have a chance to adapt to the situation and master new skills to do the tasks needed for the further development of the project. Creative environment. It’s widely known that people who take risks and start new businesses have a lot of ideas and welcome creativity. They explore new approaches, products, and services to be original. That’s why you should contact the founders who will help you see everything from a new perspective. Professional growth. Working in a startup from the very beginning enables you to build a foundation of necessary skills and knowledge, gain experiences in different functional areas, and take responsibility for multiple tasks. Besides, as a business grows, you will grow as a professional by obtaining new career opportunities. Friendly team. Since the majority of startups are small, you’ll have the chance to get acquainted with all your colleagues personally. You’ll also share your ideas and thoughts with your team to boost the company’s success. Joining a startup is like becoming a part of a family. Career opportunities. Sometimes a large company pays more than a startup can afford. However, in a startup, you can obtain new incentives and skills while doing completely different tasks. In the long run, you’ll have irreplaceable experience as a professional. Let’s now proceed to the steps to build a startup from scratch. 7Steps to Building a Startup from Scratch Find a good idea Develop a business plan Ensure you have adequate capital Choose the right people Pick a location and design a site Learn how to leverage digital marketing techniques Create your customer base If you are interested in launching a startup on your own, it’s critical to consider the following steps to achieve success. Find a good idea. To be successful, entrepreneurs search for products and services that are in great demand among customers. Analyze the demand, customers' needs and wants, and make sure that people actually need your product. You should also figure out whether your product will be able to attain at least ten clients. This will help you decide which product you want to create and in which direction to move. However, before putting your idea into practice, do your market research and analyze your competitors. Develop a business plan. Having an idea isn’t enough since the process also requires a business plan. A business plan is a document that contains a company’s objectives and ways to achieve its goals. It also includes a description of the business future and an outline of business strategy. Statistics show that people with a plan succeeded in obtaining investment capital and growing their startups. Ensure you have adequate capital. There’s no definite amount of money you need to start a business since the costs of a startup vary from one industry to another. Depending on the type of business and the situation, you’ll need more or less funding. Some small startups without equipment and employee salaries might cost you approximately $10,000, while other ventures might cost millions. The main source of financing is usually the entrepreneur’s savings. Choose the right people. You can’t disagree with the fact that to solve all issues you need some additional help. However, remember to choose people whom you trust wisely. You’ll need some employees and a manager to run a company. The number of workers depends on the industry you are in and how big your business is. Based on statistics, startups are small companies that have small teams. In general, startups consist of up to ten employees. Pick a location and design a site. You need to have a physical and a web address so that customers can easilyfind your company. Consider buying or leasinga property to operate your business. Although purchasing it is significantly cheaper in the long run, you need to ensure you have enough costs. This way, you’ll save funds and have a good investment in your future beginnings. Design a site to promote your startup, take some pre-orders, and schedule possible appointments. Online presence is a must because it helps reach your target audience faster, promote products, and generate profit. LIKE.TG has a greatlanding page builder that will help you design a landing page for your startup in just 15 minutes. Learn how to leverage digital marketing techniques. You can have a great product, but you won’t be able to promote itwithout various marketing techniques. Consider the following marketing strategies: SEO, content marketing, social media marketing, email marketing, and PPC. LIKE.TG allows you to inform your customers about your new product with the help of email campaigns, web push, chatbots, and SMS. You can also take advantage of traditional methods such as print advertising, television, and radio. However, it’s more helpful to adapt to new trends and useinbound marketing. Create your customer base. After developing a site, growing your digital presence, and becoming a good marketer, it’s time to build a customer base. Create a convenient website to provide your consumers with a seamless experience and encourage them to come back. To get repeat customers, you need to provide high-quality products and excellent customer service. Your clients are your main priority, so treat them accordingly. You can also create subscription forms with LIKE.TG without even knowing HTML to build a customer base. Our world is changing very quickly, and innovations and new ideas come to replace the previous ones. Startups are a result of bringing new ideas to life as they change people’s lives, solve their problems, and simplify their daily routines. With LIKE.TG, you can promote your startup for free.

SPF is an abbreviation of the Sender Policy Framework, which is an email validation system designed to detect email spoofing. Why was SPF implemented? Before 2002, when the idea of SPF was brought to public attention and stirred a broad discussion, electronic mail exchange relied on SMTP(Simple Mail Transfer Protocol), with no additional sender address checking. The problem with SMTP is that it does not verify the validity of the sender's address, so the sender can put any email address they want in the "from" section. This deficiency was frequently taken advantage of by spammers and phishers. Phishers could enter a forged email address in the "from" section and send emails to bank clients, who, not suspecting anything untoward, shared personal bank details. This way, spammers and phishers were hiding their real identity and avoiding responsibility. How does SPF work? SPF allows the users to specify which computers are authorized to send emails from the domain name they have registered in the DNS. As the "from" section is at the beginning of the SMTP dialog, receivers can verify the SPF record. If the source address in the "from" section is unauthorized, the message gets rejected. If the email address does not hold any SPF record, it is likely to be caught up in the spamfilters, which improves the general situation with spamming.

Sponsored content is promotional content created by an advertiser but posted by another publisher, brand, or influencer. From a user’s point of view, it’s easy to detect paid content because it is marked as “Paid post,” “Includes paid promotion,” “Presented by,” “Sponsored by,” “Partnered with,” “Promoted,” “Affiliated with,” “Powered by,” etc. Let’s find out why companies actively use sponsored content in their digital marketing strategies. Whyis sponsored content effective? There are three main reasons why sponsored content is an effective tactic. It’s relevant and authoritative, which means that a good portion of users who engage with a content publisher or influencer will enjoy sponsored content, too. It only works this way when it’s delivered by two brands that operate in neighboring fields and when their target audiences share some common values. The mechanism that stands behind sponsored content creation is simple. Two brands agree on apartnershipand discuss their conditions. Usually, one brand (an advertiser) creates content and pays another brand, social media influencer, or publisher for sharing it with their audience. Sometimes brands cooperate to create content together and cross-promote it to their subscribers. Sponsored content is a simple yet effective way to deliver your promotional message to new audiences. Let’s find out which pros and cons this type of content has. Pros and Cons of Sponsored Content Sponsored content has the following advantages: it adds credibility and trustworthiness to your brand image since it is shown alongside other things that a viewer enjoys; it improves theuser experience rather than interrupting it like regular advertising posts; it can appear in any format or media, which makes sponsored content quite a flexible strategy; it is beneficial for both parties since both brands acquire new subscribers from such a collaboration. Sponsored content has the following cons: social media platforms and laws in some countries require that it must be stated that content is sponsored, so the corresponding mark may ruin nativity; some users have negative expectations knowing this content is paid for; an irrelevant sponsored content campaign may disrupt the user experience, bring some negative feedback, and increase unsubscribe rates, which leads to reputation issues. Let’s find out the difference between sponsored and branded content types. Sponsored Content vs. Branded Content As we already know, sponsored content is a paid advertisement where one brand is a creator, and another one is a publisher. In contrast, branded content is created and distributed by the same brand or at least by different departments of one large company. Branded content is usually published on brand-owned properties such as blogs, micro-sites, content hubs, forums, etc. Another key difference is that branded content can only be targeted at a brand’s existing audience. It helps increase a brand’s trustworthiness by creating content with a high level of expertise, while sponsored content is a great way to grow your audience. Let’s find out what sponsored content can look like. Sponsored Content Ideas Any type of content you can think of can be sponsored because it isn’t restricted to any format or style. The only thing that separates regular content from sponsored is a sponsorship deal that stays behind the scenes. Sponsored content can be presented in the following formats: articles; listicles (articles with lists of best artists, brands, services, etc.); videos; photos; infographics; tweets on Twitter; pins on Pinterest; Instagram posts, Stories, and IGTV videos; Facebook posts and Stories; Snapchat Stories; YouTube videos and shorts; podcasts, etc. As you can see from the list above, sponsored content is mostly used across social media platforms. Each platform allows to deliver this type of content in a different form. That’s why social media feeds are a great fit for sponsored posts. Let’s get inspired by some great examples of sponsored content. Examples of Sponsored Content We’ve collected several examples where companies wisely use sponsored content in their strategy. Taco Bell Snapchat Snapchat is a popular image and video sharing platform that has a “filter” feature where users can alter their faces and surroundings. Taco Bell collaborated with Snapchat to create a sponsored filter that went viral and gathered over 224 million views. Aside from the filter, Taco Bell created a series of promotions on Snapchat Stories. Users had a lot of fun with this Taco-face filter as they enjoyed it without being interrupted. Here’s how it looked. Source: MobileSyrup Vanguard Shopify Podcasts continue to gain popularity, and sponsored podcasts are a great way to increase brand awareness if the company that hosts the program is related to your business field. In this piece of sponsored content, Shopify supported small businesses by raising a discussion about how small companies, subculture representatives, and local communities make money today. People can listen to this podcast on Spotify or Apple Music. It’s promoted by Shopify but is solely created by Vanguard. UEFA Champions League Heineken Heineken collaborated with the UEFA Champions League in a series of sponsored Instagram Stories. It allowed the brewery brand to target European football fans and promote Heineken as a go-to beverage when watching UCL matches. Thanks to detailed targeting options, this sponsored content does not interrupt the user experience, and the story (like any Heineken advertisement) is fun and smart. Source: ActiveCampaign Congratulations, now you know what sponsored content is, why it is effective for businesses, and in which forms it can appear.

A spam trap is an email address that is owned and used by Internet Service Providers, anti-spam organizations, and blacklist operators to detect and catch spammers. Spam traps don’t belong to a real person or may have been owned by someone at one time but are now abandoned. Spam traps don’t send emails, have no opens, and don’t give permission to receive emails. Spam is a significant problem for a lot of internet users. According to Statista, spam accounted for 53.5% of the total email traffic in the world as of September 2018. A spam trap is designed to look for everything like a real email address so that it can attract spam and shut down its travel path by blocking the sender's IP address. Why are spam traps dangerous for email marketers? A spam trap is exclusively created to receive junk mail, and all messages that it receives are classified as spam. Therefore, if an email is sent to such an address, the sender reputation is negatively affected. The sender consequently gets higher bounce rates and reduced email deliverability. It may also lead to: Blacklist providers and ISPs can block the IP address. Email Service Providers can refuse to send one’s emails to protect their customers and business. Recipient’s ISP can ban one’s emails and blacklist the associated domain. Anti-spam organizations can share the sender domain with all the ISPs that they work with, which leads to blocking any email from the domain. How does a spam trap work? Spam traps are a form of protection system used by ISPs such as Google, Yahoo to safeguard their recipients. They keep email inboxes free from messages that users don’t want and are usually created to trick spammers. Spam traps are also hidden and almost undetectable. The most obvious place to find spam traps is in random email addresses’ lists from the internet. Spam traps are monitored continuously by ISPs and blacklist providers. Any email sent to them is traced, and the sender is blacklisted. A marketer who doesn’t follow email sending best practices is at higher risk of adding spam traps to their mailing list. Types of Spam Traps Spam traps can be classified based on how they were created and the way they operate. There are two basic types of spam traps: Pristine spam traps. Also known as pure spam traps, these addresses are designed initially to be spam traps and were never a valid email address from the start. They are usually hidden within a public websites’ code. They don’t belong to a real person and can’t agree to receive emails. These spam traps help to catch marketers parsing emails on sites or buying contact lists. Recycled spam traps. These are addresses that were once valid and owned by real people — and may have even signed up on several websites — but are no longer in use and are invalidated. Their providers can repurpose them and monitor senders. Any sender who continues to send emails is categorized as a spammer. How to Avoid Spam Trap Email Addresses If there is one thing that email marketers should know before launching any campaign is how to keep off spam traps. Sending emails to recycled and pristine spam traps can gravely affect businesses’ reputation. Here are two ways to avoid email spam traps with LIKE.TG: Set up double opt-in subscription forms Use LIKE.TG to set up customized subscription forms with double opt-in function. When a visitor subscribes, an email with a link is sent to them to confirm their subscription. So, if the new subscriber doesn’t confirm their subscription, their address is not added to the mailing list. Verify your mailing list Email verification is a must if you haven't sent emails in a long time, collected addresses using single opt-in, or added them manually to your mailing list. Verify them with our tool to remove outdated and invalid addresses and increase your email deliverability. You can check up to 100 emails each month for free. Clean up mailing lists regularly Mailing list hygiene is essential since your base may contain the email addresses of clients who made a purchase three years ago and are no longer interested. To check your mailing list quality, send a reactivation email campaign to passive subscribers. If they don’t interact, remove them from the mailing list. This way, you will deal only with the engaged audience. So, if youfollow the best practices while sending email campaigns, your mailing list will be safe from spam traps.

Spamhaus is a non-profit organization established by Steve Lindford in 1998. Spamhaus tracks email spammers and spam-like activity. The name is a pseudo-German word used to signify an organization, which works with spammer activity. Spamhaus is comprised of several companies, which run anti-spam activity in different aspects of the Spamhaus anti-spam technology. The organization is responsible for creating several big lists of spammers, which are widely used by ISPsand email servers to reduce the amount of unsolicited mail in their users' mailboxes. Spamhaus distributes the lists as DNS-based Blocklists and Whitelists. Small email servers can use these lists free of charge, while more significant commercial organizations, which have many queries, have to sign up for the Datafeed Service. Spamhaus's Spammer Lists Include Spamhaus Block List – a list of known "verified" spammers Exploits Block List – the list of open proxies, which are used to send out spam Policy Block List – both dynamic and static IP addresses, such as ISP's core routers, which are required by their policy to send mail through third-party servers Domain Block List – a list of well-known spammers and spam gangs, as well as websites, which are related to phishing, virus, and malware spreading Botnet Controller List – Spamhaus believes that cyber criminals control these IP addresses Spamhaus Whitelists Include Spamhaus White List – a list of verified IPv4 and IPv6 addresses with good reputations. Such addresses have to comply with the strict rules of Spamhaus Domain White List – this white list of domain names implies automatic certification of domains with DKIMsignatures

A social media strategy is a well-thought-out plan that indicates when, how, and what content to share on multiple socials of a brand. It helps you use resources efficiently and reach your target audience. In this video, Alex, a LIKE.TG marketer, shares valuable insights on how to boost your social media strategy with chatbots. This article will uncover 14 reasons to create a strategy for social platforms and what you should do to develop it successfully. 14 Reasons Why You Need a Social Media Strategy According to statistics, around 4.62 billion people worldwide are social media users. Although the initial purpose of Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter was to provide communication, it’s no longer their main goal. Oberlo’s marketers emphasize the three main reasons users spend time on social networks: exploring news and trends, finding things to do, and products to purchase. Since many customers use social platforms every day, you need to build a strategy for each social network. Establishing a brand from scratch on social media without a well-thought-out strategy can be challenging and require excessive expenditures. In this section, we’ll review the main reasons for you to consider developing a strategy. It will help you establish a strong online presence; expand your reach; increase the base of leads and customers; use resources efficiently; save time and money; target your audience with personalized offers; increase engagement; provide users with relevant content; get a competitive advantage; stand out from the competition; attract new consumers with influencer’s help; build a positive brand reputation; gain brand recognition; earn customer loyalty. Now that you have enough arguments to work on your tactics, it’s time to dive into the steps. The next section will guide you through the process of developing your detailed plan for social media and help you do everything right. 10 Steps to Create a Social Media Strategy Define your goals Research your target audience Conduct competitive analysis Run social media audit Develop a social media content calendar Create engaging content Leverage social media management software Provide support with chatbots Use advertising to expand the reach Analyze social media metrics and adjust your strategy A gut feeling doesn’t work with social media. To achieve success, you need to develop the tactics of what, when, and how to do to generate interest, build communities, and encourage purchases. A social media strategy is your guide of actions in the world of social users. In this section, we’ll unveil the steps you should take to reach your business purpose on social networks. 1. Define your goals If you want to develop a winning strategy, determine your primary objectives. Together with metrics, they will help you evaluate the success of your strategy. Use the SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely) framework to set your objectives. For example, we will use a chatbot for Instagram to reduce the response time of our customer support on this platform in two months. Besides goals, you need to identify valuable metrics and monitor them to see the progress of your strategy. At this stage, likes and followers don’t bring real value. The metrics you should track depend on your key goals. For instance, if you use Instagram to boost traffic to your site, track click-throughs from your bio link, ads, and stories. 2. Research your target audience Before creating an offer, you should understand your audience and know what they want to see on socials. After researching your target market, create a buyer persona to understand your audience and target them with personalized offers. To develop a detailed persona, you should identify their age, interests, location, income, occupation, preferred social media channels, etc. Remember, followers on your social media accounts are your potential customers, so treat them accordingly. Explore their needs and desires to find out how to approach and engage them. Social networks like Instagram have an Insights tab that allows you to obtain helpful information about your followers: their gender, age, location, interaction with your company, and more. Below you can see an example of Instagram Insights. 3. Conduct competitive analysis Since 58.4% of the world population now uses social platforms, the odds are that your rivals already have profiles on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. So you should create appealing profiles to attract followers. Your competitors will help you develop a successful strategy. To take advantage of your rivals, conduct a competitor analysisto reveal their strengths and weaknesses. By examining the social accounts of your rivals, you can find your biggest competitors, uncover the platforms they use, and the content they create and assess the level of customer engagement. With analysis, you’ll be able to identify the best time for publishing, find new marketing approaches, get inspired to create engaging pieces of content, explore trends and topics, and unveil the pain points of your target market. After you research, you can identify the gaps. Eliminate these problems as soon as possible. 4. Run social media audit A social media audit is the process of a business reviewing its key metrics to assess the performance of its social media strategy. The audit covers every social media channel and environment, sentiment, challenges, and opportunities for each of them. Once you finish the audit, you’ll understand the desires of your target audience. You’ll be able to identify the most successful platforms, determine a content schedule, and figure out the most appealing type of content for your brand. As a result, you’ll focus on the alterations to your strategy, which lead toward the achievement of your initial business goals. If you already have accounts on social networks, you need to evaluate your efforts so far. Analyze everything you have done for your social media since you created accounts: the strengths and weaknesses, people who like to engage with your brand, the channels they prefer the most, and your social media performance compared to competitors. After doing an audit, you’ll find out the purpose of each account. Yet if the channel’s purpose isn’t clear, consider revising or transforming it. Below you can see a social media audit example. It covers elements you should include. 5. Develop a social media content calendar Social media calendar is an outline of your upcoming publishings on socials, organized by date. You can create a calendar manually with a spreadsheet or leverage a special tool. To share posts on time, your content calendar should have the date and time of publishing, the platforms you want to add the content to, creative assets, and useful links. Social media calendar enables your team to save time, provide users with consistent content, reduce mistakes, and improve content quality. Besides, when all team members have access to the spreadsheet or a management tool, they can proofread the posts and avoid typos. Below you can see a HubSpot calendar template. This is what a content calendar looks like if you decide to choose a specific management platform. 6. Create engaging content Having a huge social media audience doesn’t guarantee your business' success. If you struggle to generate the interest of your target audience and gain attention on socials, you should create engaging content. Instagram is a perfect platform for interaction with your followers. Consider implementing engaging ways to communicate with your audience. Create polls for Instagram Stories, use specific hashtags, ask followers about their experience and opinion, provide customer stories, and share valuable data in carousel posts. Besides, ask followers what sort of information they would like to see next, implement QA time, and provide some games. Make use of the most successful Instagram format reels — 15-second multi-clip videos with audio. You can share useful tips, lifehacks, effective platforms, and step-by-step guides. People will love them and like, comment, and share. Below you can see Lavazza inviting followers to play the well-known “Bingo” game to increase engagement and reactions. According to statistics, users are 35% more likely to sign up after seeing original pictures of a brand. That’s why consider making your own photos and videos instead of using stock materials. Besides, you can hire a professional who will create brilliant branded graphics for your socials or use a web-based platform to design it on your own. Every marketer will recognize Neil Patel and his brand. In the video below, Neil Patel explains how to use Google ads. Consider including customer testimonials on your social media. Testimonials help establish trusting relationships with customers and build a positive brand image. 79% of consumers trust customer reviews as much as friends’ recommendations. Below you can see how Club Life Design shares reviews of its digital product. The brand includes all customer testimonials in Instagram Highlights. 7. Leverage social media management software Social media management tools empower you to handle several social media from one place, build relationships with followers, and develop an editorial calendar to publish posts on time. In addition to increased engagement, such platforms enable you to track and analyze social performance. Whether you have a startup, a family company, or a large enterprise, you can find a tool for any business size. Social media managers are often overwhelmed with the social media tasks they need to complete every day. Hopefully, you can consider many platforms to keep an eye on the processes like content creation, scheduling, and tracking performance. Hootsuite, Buffer, Sprout Social, and Agorapulse allow you to manage multiple socials from one place, which is extremely convenient and time-efficient. 8. Provide support with chatbots According to statistics, bot-only chats receive an 87.58% satisfaction rate. Chatbots imitate human conversation and allow your company to provide 24/7 support. Once social media users have inquiries, they can send you a direct message and receive an instant autoreply on common questions. You can employ chatbots for the biggest social networks like Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter to provide users with instant information. For instance, accounts of online shops on Instagram incorporate chatbots to give real-time responses to people’s questions. They use quick-reply buttons like “prices,” “available items,” “sizes,” “delivery,” etc. As a result, they immediately receive answers to their questions. If you are interested in making the work of your customer support agents more efficient and reducing the workload, consider using a chatbot builder. With LIKE.TG’s chatbots, you can set up auto-replies to answer FAQs, move prospects down the sales funnel, send personalized messages and reminders, gather customer feedback, and respond to brand mentions on Instagram and Facebook. Below you can see an example of a chatbot created with LIKE.TG. 9. Use advertising to expand the reach Instagram is home to 1.47 billion active users who spend around 29 minutes daily on the platform. This time is enough to communicate with friends, explore trending, and search for products. Yet brands still search for the best places for their ads. Companies should run ads on social media to expand their reach, generate new leads, drive traffic to their websites, and increase sales volume and revenues. Use paid advertising to present your product to potential clients and build awareness. If you succeed in capturing attention, users will follow the link and visit your profile or website. After exploring your content and product features, they will make a decision. You can apply different types of advertising based on your main business purpose. Social media platforms offer you to make use of photo ads, video ads, and stories ads. You have the option to run campaigns manually or use Facebook Business Suite, AdEspresso, Hootsuite, or Revealbot. Retargeting helps you target people who have already visited your site or social media accounts. It ensures more touchpoints with prospective customers, boosts conversions and sales, and encourages brand recognition. Sponsored content is a type of promotional advertising that involves a sponsor (company) paying a publisher (influencer, opinion leader, industry expert, or marketing agency) for promoting a brand on social media platforms. It helps showcase your product, expand your reach, increase your following, and drive sales. Below you can see an example of Thinkific’s sponsored ad on Facebook. This advertising targets users who show interest in the product. 10. Analyze social media metrics and adjust your strategy Creating a profitable social media strategy is challenging, so it can’t be perfect on the first try. However, you can always improve it. To do it, look at the performance metrics to see what’s missing in your strategy. Pay attention to reach, engagement, impressions, conversions, referrals, and response rate. Besides these metrics, you can also track UTM parameters (short text codes linked to your URLs). Parameters show the value of social media campaigns, provide information about traffic and conversions, and measure ROI. Use this data to improve your strategy. For instance, change the frequency of posts, implement storytelling, or add customer testimonials to communicate your value. Test different options to find the most effective strategy for your business. Leverage a special social management service to check the performance of each platform. Assign this task to a certain person to do it every day and have a clear picture of moving towards goals. Now you know what social media strategy is and why it’s crucial. Hopefully, our ideas and examples inspired you to do everything in your power to work out an effective strategy.