Igniting Business Blog

In an era where 94 percent say an online review has convinced them to avoid a business, reputation management online is more important than ever. Here are four areas to focus on when it comes to managing your brand's reputation on the web. 

Starting a new year is often a time of personal reflection to determine areas of personal growth for the new year.  Likewise, January is a great time to reflect on areas of growth for your small business.  When it comes to marketing and your small business’ digital presence, you may feel overwhelmed by the variety of avenues, platforms, tactics, and strategies.  Rather than giving up before the year even begins or chasing strategies in (what seems like) 50 million directions, check out our suggestions below to focus your small business on 4 key marketing avenues and successful tactics in each of those avenues. 

When most people consider content marketing, they focus almost entirely on creating the actual content. While that's important, as you need to have quality content to grab and hold your audience's attention, a creator needs to also have a plan for how they're going to get people to pay attention to the content. Otherwise, your message will easily be lost in the shuffle.

Pay-per click marketing, commonly shortened to just PPC, is one of the most popular methods of advertising on the Internet. While it may seem simple at first glance, it takes a lot of hard work and experience to get the most out of a PPC marketing campaign.

We often hear confusion from small businesses about the best way to generate, utilize, and promote content.  In the hustle and bustle of running a small business, the benefit of consistent content generation can often be overlooked.  If you're trying to up your content generation strategy, here are some little changes your small business should consider.

Different platforms need different marketing videos. Just like you would customize material for different audiences, demographics, and broadcasting channels, every video advertisement needs to be built according to guidelines of where you're posting it online. Facebook videos, for example, should be short, graphically exciting, and translate well without sound. On the other hand, YouTube videos on your channel need to be informative, instantly recognizable, and easy to follow. However, YouTube advertisements are something else entirely. Here's how to get the most mileage out of YouTube advertisements specifically.

In our blog last week, we discussed 3 key elements to improve your search rankings.  Today, we dive even deeper into some search engine optimization (SEO) tactics that can elevate your small business website even more.  Once you’ve created your keywords list, apply the tactics below for maximum impact.

A small business today can do a lot of marketing online, whether that small business exists as a brick-and-mortar store or as an ecommerce venture existing entirely online. One key element of marketing any type of business online is your company's presence on Google for various search phrases customers are using to look for products or service providers. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) can put your brand at the top of search engine rankings for your targeted keywords. Below are three key ways you can work towards a better Google ranking for your brand.

According to a report by Forrester's on 2018 mobile web sales, smartphones will be used in more than one-third (accounting for over $1 trillion) of total U.S. retail sales at some point in the buying process in 2018, including research, price comparisons, and purchases. This indicates people are accessing mobile data from anywhere and everywhere on the go and are prepared to make purchasing decisions on their mobile devices.

Your social media followers don't immediately convert into customers. The process takes time. Converting followers into customers takes a bit of posting and management strategy. Your audience consists of a wide range of users, and the same directly promotional content for long-time followers won't appeal to new viewers. Mix good, fresh content into your feed, rather than strictly promote your small business. Here are three ways to do that while staying on brand: