Key 3 Media marketing newsletter, Winter 2014

Page 2 – Social media choicesPage 3 – Famous quotes, Business mistakesPage 4 – Blogging cheat sheetPage 5 – Financial advice, Interesting factsPage 6 – Holiday review: JerseyPage 7 – Health article, The brilliance of EvernotePage 8 – Marketing geniusC

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Because there’s a big difference between a Because there’s a big difference between a business surviving and a business thriving.business surviving and a business thriving.

WELCOME to the second of our printed newsletters, packed with marketing tips and business insight to help your company grow.

Issue 2: Autumn/Winter 2014

We’ve been in the media industry since the 1990s and have seen so much change. I fondly remember working at Carlton TV when there was little satellite competition, no Channel 5 and the internet was a fad. But new things do come along and sometimes they are to be ignored at one’s peril.

Many business owners are still ignoring the internet, and even more social media. Print advertising has its place in the marketing mix of course but it is becoming more expensive whilst circulation decreases. Online marketing off ers a host of cost eff ective – or even free – marketing tools, and hopefully in this issue we’ll cover a number of them off for you :) Andy Rao

“Marketing “Marketing Matters”Matters”

How Google continues to changeAh, remember the “good ol’ days” when to get your website high up on Google you just mentioned what you did and where you were based 20 times?! Things certainly have changed, although looking at some businesses’ websites you wouldn’t have thought so.

Keyword stuffi ng is still going on everywhere. Why? Because it’s easy. But it doesn’t work anymore. In fact, if Google thinks you are keyword stuffi ng, they could penalise you by dumping you down the rankings. Google is all-powerful now, which isn’t necessarily a good thing but you have to play the game. You want your website to be found after all. No point having a Ferrari if you’re going to keep it in the garage.

So how do you maximize your Search Engine Optimization? You could pay an SEO company, of course, but be careful. Good SEO companies should be hiring copywriters as often as they are techy guys. Content is king. This has always been the case in marketing, but more so than ever with SEO. Google wants people who are online looking for stuff to fi nd

relevant human-readable information provided by what they perceive to be credible companies.

Are you blogging your expert opinions regularly? Do you have links coming to your website from social media? Have you registered on YouTube and Google+? G+ is a bit of a bugbear of mine because, let’s face it, it’s a poor man’s Facebook. But Google will look upon you more favourably the more of their products you use. 2014 was supposed to be the year of G+ when all that happened was its Chief walked out and they cancelled Google Authorship.

What good SEO boils down to, essentially, is time. Google will be looking for businesses that are putting time into their web content and keeping it fresh. Having a technically well-built website is the foundation, yes, but then it must be looked after. To maintain the car analogy, when you buy a new car it’s going to run like clockwork. But if you stop cleaning it, getting it serviced and MOT’d… it will start underperforming.When Google can strip eBay of 80% of its organic listings overnight, every website is at their mercy. Whether we like it or not, it is happening.ning.

Sign & Print: proud supporters of Marketing Matters. For all your business printing needs, call Allun on 01743 290383

Emma, Andy & CatherineEmma, Andy & Catherine


Which social media should I be using for my business?

Know someone who’d like to receive Marketing Matters? Point them to www.k3mfreenewsletter.co.uk

We get asked this a lot. There’s a lot of pressure on businesses to have a strong social media presence, just like there was to have a website ten years ago. But, as always, if something’s worth doing it’s worth doing well.

So don’t jump on the bandwagon of adopting every single social media out there if you can’t make the time to fi rstly understand how they work, and then look after the accounts and monitor them. You need to budget for time too, as again good marketing will always boil down to good content. So if you’re throwing yourself into Twitter, for example, and fi nd yourself posting about the type of herbal tea you’re drinking, don’t bother. Unless you’re in the herbal tea business, I guess…!

Facebook is our favourite social media, and we make no bones about that. It’s the biggest, it’s easy for all ages and abilities to use, and their advertising options are hugely cost eff ective. Facebook is usually the fi rst channel we suggest to clients, especially if they are Business-to-Consumer. I stress “usually”, because if I were helping a Financial Adviser, I’d probably prioritize a combination of Twitter, LinkedIn and blogging.

Some people think it’s easy to run multiple social media channels because they post the same stuff across all of them, often at the same time. But we advise against this. In an ideal world, you want everyone following you everywhere. If, say, you’ve got your Facebook and Twitter accounts linked and you’ve got Sue following you on both, you don’t want to be hitting Sue with the same posts at the same time. For many small business owners, this means maxing out at maybe two social media channels – that’s enough to be looking after.

If you are in a very visual industry, such as graphic design or arts & crafts, Pinterest is an excellent medium. Pinterest is also the 2nd largest social media driver of web traffi c (source: Shareaholic). So if you’re in a visual business and your website is important, Pinterest is defi nitely worth a look – if you can devote the time to it.

Google+…. Now, my opinion here will diff er to many other social media bods. Despite having a massive base of users, Google+ is the “underdog” cool people want to win, so they can say, “I liked them fi rst.” Like those indie kids in school who only listened to bands no one else did! My main gripe is that it’s just not much fun to use. And if it ain’t fun, people won’t engage. The Google Hangouts facility is good for video calls, but then you’ve got Skype and Facetime for that.

As far as my businesses are concerned, Google+ has a place in the marketing mix only from an SEO point-of-view. You post links to your website from Google+

and it will allegedly help your Google rankings. It is Google holding a gun to your head.

“The more of my products you use, the more I’ll look after you.” Therefore it’s advantageous to register on YouTube as that is also owned by Google, and video is the way forward after all. Upload a few video testimonials with links back to your website and Bob’s your uncle.

I post on G+ maybe once or twice a week, and YouTube even less.

They are there for SEO and for people to see video testimonials, basically. There may be

millions of Google+ accounts but ask yourself how many of your friends, i.e. consumers, are active on there. It’s mainly businesses (and Richard Branson). But again, this is my opinion.

In summary, my general rule for a small business owner would be to focus on two social media channels and do them well, i.e. research and post interesting content on a daily basis. For me, these are Facebook and Twitter. I do have LinkedIn, Google+, Pinterest and YouTube accounts but they are very much secondary for my purposes. My goals are to reach lots of people, drive them to blogs, articles and squeeze pages and make sales. Social media has to be personable and chatty, of course, but if it ain’t making you money, i.e. generating decent enquiries, stop doing it. There may be more time-eff ective ways of increasing your brand awareness.



“There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure.” Colin Powell“Whenever you fi nd yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and refl ect.” Mark Twain“Some people regard private enterprise as a predatory tiger to be shot. Others look on it as a cow they can milk. Not enough people see it as a healthy horse, pulling a sturdy wagon.” Winston Churchill“Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.” Dale Carnegie“Disneyland is a work of love. We didn’t go into Disneyland just with the idea of making money.” Walt Disney“A man who stops advertising to save money is like a man who stops a clock to save time.” Henry Ford

Who said what? “People who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do.” Isaac Asimov“I have not the shadow of a doubt that any man or woman can achieve what I have, if he or she will

make the same eff ort, and have the same hope and faith.” Mahatma Gandhi “When you are courting a nice girl an hour seems like a second. When you sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour. That’s relativity.” Albert Einstein

“Wine is constant proof that God loves us and loves to see us happy.”

Benjamin Franklin“You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.” Wayne Gretzky“Every time I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the future of the human race.” H. G. Wells

Business quotes

Business mistakesAh, social media logos. They’re everywhere, aren’t they? “Find Us On Facebook”, “Follow Us On Twitter”, etc. etc. And why not? You are showing people that further information about you can be found on these sites.But what if you last posted on Facebook two months ago? Or that you tweet once a week and only have four people following you?If you’re going to lead a horse to water, make sure it’s fresh!Having a super snazzy ad in the paper, which you’ve paid lots of money for, is brilliant. You get a potential new customer all excited and then s/he goes off to check out your Facebook page as requested. And your Facebook page is old with out-of-focus imagery… That is your potential new customer gone. S/he is out of there, and you’ll be hard-pressed to get them back.In essence, displaying your social media logos can do more harm than good. Be honest with yourself – if your social media channels aren’t up to scratch, don’t tell people to visit them! Get them looking great and up-to-date, and only then start fl ashing the logos about town. You don’t have to display social media logos on your advertising.It’s a similar thing with website addresses. Again, be honest. If your website is rubbish, don’t lead people to it! Some businesses may be better off driving people to their Facebook page than their website. Advertise only what you can be truly proud of. Advertise only what is needed to make a good impression.Which reminds me…. Just last night I picked up a glossy monthly magazine, and a shop had taken out a full page ad. Must have cost a few hundred quid. The purpose of the ad (I presume) was to drive people into the shop. But they’d left out one vital piece of info. The actual address of the shop. I kid you not….

[For more marketing tips, register for free at www.k3mfreemarketing.co.uk]

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Free Cheat SheetWhen we say “blogging”, we simply mean the writing of news articles and sharing them online. There are blogging websites such as tumblr.com and you can create your own blog sites for free using a platform such as Wordpress. But here we are focusing more on maximising your own website from a traffi c point of view as well as visitor/enquirer conversion.

• If you can commit to writing an article at least every month, make sure you have a page on your website clearly labeled “News” or “Blog”.

• The page should have a “subscribe to” option where people can enter their fi rst name and email address or an RSS feed or both. Everything needs to be easy - so if people can automatically receive every new article you upload, it is miles better than them remembering to check in every so often... which won’t happen.

• News articles / blogs are ideally informative rather than sales-y. It is the sharing or your expertise that will strengthen your positioning in the marketplace and help make potential new clients see you as experts as well as business owners.

> Top Tips / Facts You Might Not Know / What To Watch Out For / My Comments On Something Topical / How To...

• Aim for 400 words - Google likes this :)

• Put an image at the top of each article and use keywords to name the image fi le. For example, if it’s a photo taken by your camera, the fi le name may be “IMG-1234”. Change this to “Shrewsbury- Solicitors” etc. etc., using hyphens to separate the words. • Keywords are important for the headline, summary (if there is this option) and fi rst paragraph. Location is key too if you are a local business. Don’t go overboard, mind - Google hates keyword stuffi ng, so you do want everything to be human readable - but bear in mind what people may be searching for online.

• Your website admin console should give you an SEO box for every new article, which will probably have text boxes you need to fi ll in for Title, Description and Keywords.

> Title: This is for SEO only, not the actual title of your blog. Use line separators, e.g. “Solicitors | Divorce Lawyers | Shrewsbury”.

Character limit = 60.> Description: A human readable summary of your article, to include keywords. Character limit = 160.> Keywords: This box is no longer relevant for Google, so you may as well leave it empty.

• Ensure that each new blog comes with a social media sharing function, usually at the bottom of the article. This makes it easy for readers to share your views with their contacts.

• Share each new blog yourself through your own social media channels. Paste the link into Facebook, Twitter, etc. over a number of days. Links to these new URLs on your website are good for Search Engine Optimisation.

• Frequency has to be at least once a month. Ideally once a week. Businesses that blog regularly receive 88% more leads than businesses that do not, plus enjoy 128% more traffi c. (source: HubSpot)

• If time is an issue, consider utilizing copywriters who have experience in your fi eld. They can be sourced through elance.com for as little as $20 per 400-word article.

Twitter:www.twitter.com/rao_andyFacebook:www.facebook.com/thebestofshrewsbury

article.



Important Pension NewsBy Med Evans of Darwin Wealth Management Ltd.

Life certainly doesn’t stand still in the world of pensions, we will see the next two years being the most active as regards Companies having to off er compulsory pensions to their employees where everyone who is eligible will be automatically enrolled into a scheme.

However the biggest pensions news in a generation is how the government are planning to allow far greater fl exibility on how we take our pensions in the future, these changes are due to take eff ect from the 2015/16 tax year.

Here are some of the bigger points.

From April 2015:

These are proposed changes and currently the government are in a consultation period to assess the eff ect of the changes.

From 55 whatever the size of a your pension pot, the government propose that you’ll be able to take it how you want, again the fi rst 25% will be tax free but the remainder will be subject to your marginal rate of income tax in that year.

There will be more fl exibility. People who continue to want the security of an annuity (Buying a pension income) will be able to purchase one and people who want greater control over their fi nances can draw down their pension as they see fi t.

Although on the face of this it seems straightforward I would strongly suggest seeking advice from an independent fi nancial adviser, as there are pit falls and you need to know how much you could get from a traditional annuity verses drawing down as you see fi t. Drawing down as you see fi t could mean your pension pot not lasting long at all or you could be greedy in the early years and end up paying higher rate tax! Your adviser will help ensure they meet your requirements.

For more information please feel free to call up with any questions on how the new rules could aff ect you.

www.darwinwealth.co.uk 01743 453934

Top testimonial - Holters Estate Agents

“Holters provided us with an impeccable service, not only with the sale of our property but our purchase too. They are extremely professional and helpful with queries answered practically straight away. I’d gladly recommend to anyone buying and selling their homes.” Sarah B

www.holters.co.uk

Interesting facts

Only 39 of the UK’s top 100 companies responded to tweets about their customer service, and their average response time was 8hrs 37mins. Eptica

42% of mobile phone owners would watch more video on their mobiles if the screens were bigger. Strategy Analytics

A customer is 4 times more likely to buy from a competitor if the problem is service related vs. price or product related.Bain & Co.

More people own a mobile phone than a toothbrush. (An estimated 4billion vs. 3.5billion.) 60 Second Marketer

80% of Pinterest users are women. Mashable

12% of sick days are fake. The Sun

There are over 30,000 people called John Smith in England. Travelholic

Facebook is primarily blue because Mark Zuckerberg suff ers from red / green colour blindness. cnn.com

66% of consumers have made a purchase online as a result of an email marketing message. Econsultancy

“Yahoo” is an acronym for “Yet Another Hierarchical Offi cious Oracle”. BuzzFeed



We sometimes spend hours on a plane jet-setting it to faraway places. Yet there is a diamond destination right on our doorstep. This past summer, for the fi rst time, we made the short leap to the largest Channel Island that is Jersey.

We’ve got family over in Jersey and every year for ages we’ve been saying we must go and see them. And then we somehow end up in Spain…. But this year we fi nally did it and, boy, was it a great decision.

For starters, it’s only a 50-minute fl ight from Birmingham! 50 minutes! For anyone with young children, you know just how sweet that sounds. The plane on the way out had propellers, which gave me horrendous fl ashbacks to an internal fl ight I took in India back in the 80s. But apart from that, the journey was brilliant.

Jersey itself is only 46 square miles. It is a British Crown dependency, which means it is ruled by Her Majesty Elizabeth II but has its own fi nancial, legal and judicial systems. They accept British money, but if you get your change in Jersey money, you can’t use it back in Blighty. A good excuse to spend any Jersey money you have left before you come home!

As well as a host of fabulous beaches and surfi ng opportunities (St. Ouen’s beach on the west coast was our favourite), there is plenty to see and do. The Jersey War Tunnels is probably the best place to visit… if you’re into your History, of course. Jersey was occupied by the Nazis from 1940 – 1945, and the story is fascinating, all told via the underground tunnels and hospital in St. Lawrence. They’ve even got a genuine Enigma decoding machine. (Our daughter said, “Why do you want to take a photo of a boring old typewriter?”)

Jersey is host to some fantastic restaurants. We can highly recommend The Boat House in St. Aubin. Fantastic seafood and service. It’s a good place to people-watch too! We tried fi ve or six restaurants whilst we were there and the quality remained high. There was no ‘cheap and cheerful’, and you can expect to pay around London prices.

Petrol and diesel are less expensive over there though. If you’re looking to hire a car, there’s no point getting a super-fast one as the speed limit is 40mph…. Yet we’d never seen so many Porsches! Must be a status thing….

Holiday ReviewJersey

one with young child



Health article…because there’s no point having wealth if you haven’t got health! I’m Rob Hall, Health & Fitness Operations Manager at The Shrewsbury Club gym. I’d like to talk about looking after your back.

We don’t think about our backs very much… until they start causing us pain! Many people put up with niggles and aches but it’s better if they didn’t happen in the fi rst place. So here are my top tips on how to maintain a healthy back:

Keeping a Healthy Weight Have you ever been had to carry a big rucksack on your back? Extra weight is not good for the whole body, let alone your back, so you need to watch the excess pounds.

Strengthen your LegsThe leg muscles are important in good body mechanics. Strong leg muscles also help alleviate extra strain on your back when lifting heavy items (bend at the knees, remember?!). Squats and deadlifts are good all-round strengtheners but make sure you get shown how to do them by a professional instructor.

Good Posture & SupportMaintaining good posture when you sit or drive reduces the strain on your back. If you’re in your offi ce a lot, invest in a chair that’s recommended by Physiotherapists. If you drive long journeys, consider buying a lumbar support (it looks like a rolled-up towel). N.B. Holding your phone between your ear and your shoulder is a surefi re way to a bad back and neck! Stop that immediately!

Buy a Comfortable MattressWe spend a third of our lives asleep, so it makes good sense to invest in a good mattress. It’s the Goldilocks scenario – you want one that’s not too soft, not too hard – just right! So it’s best to test a mattress out in the shop rather than buy online.

T: 01743 493093 | E: [email protected]

App spotlight - EvernoteIf you like carrying a paper and pen with you to make notes, then Evernote could make note-taking even simpler for you. No bulky notepads, no pen-searching or pens running out… just a handy app on your phone. And it’s free!

Evernote is a virtual notepad, basically. You want to write a note, you open up the app and type away. You can write one line, you can write an essay – it’s up to you. It automatically syncs with your computer, so whatever notes are stored on your phone can be accessed, edited or deleted from your main workstation.

One of the best features in my book is that Evernote gives you a camera option. So, if you see something you think is cool or that you’d like to copy for yourself – you take a pic of it in Evernote and that gets saved too.

What about if you lost your notepad? That’s it – your creative juices lost forever. If you lose your smartphone, your Evernote notes will still be accessible through your computer. (Hopefully any other important data on your phone is also backed up somewhere.)

I’m still fond of the paper and pen, don’t get me wrong. I’ll scribble on a post-it note as much as the next person. But good business apps are there to make our lives easier. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t make money. (Evernote makes money by off ering a paid-for premium service.) You can’t embrace every single new piece of technology of course but there really isn’t a downside to using a free tool such as Evernote. Give it a whirl.


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Sponsor spotlightthebestof Shrewsbury provides a unique local marketing and advertising service. We give recommended companies ongoing, pro active promotional support through our high traffi c website, blogs, e-newsletters, social media channels and personal contacts. Size isn’t everything, but our database is massive!

Key 3 Media helps business owners across the UK who need someone to take care of all or some of their marketing but do not want the expense (or headache) of having the role in-house. Services ranges from copywriting and social media training to full marketing retainers and social media management.

Want to get hold of us?T: 01743 851976

E: [email protected] [email protected]

W: www.thebestofshrewsbury.co.uk www.key3media.co.uk Mytton Barn, Mytton, Shrewsbury, SY4 1EU

Contact details

Many restaurants are missing a trick when it comes to getting fi rst-time customers to return. In fact, it’s not just restaurants – this can apply to a whole host of businesses.

We were walking through town one lunchtime and quite a few restaurants were empty. Yet one place was packed. So we went in to see why (we were hungry too, not just nosey).

The food and service were good and it was excellent value, that’s for sure. But the cool marketing stuff came after the meal. We were given a form, about the size of a comp slip. It asked if we’d like to share info about ourselves in return for their special off ers and news. Plus it highlighted the fact that we’d get a free dessert the next time we came in. Just for giving a few details.

Name and email address – that’s all you need at the basic level. This form also asked for my birthday, and said that if I booked a table for 4+ for my birthday, they’d throw in a complimentary bottle of bubbly. (No doubt I’d get an email reminder about this off er a few weeks before my birthday.)

Capturing customer data isn’t rocket science but how many times have you bought something in a shop or restaurant then left without a member of staff asking you for your details? And off ering an incentive for those details? You give them your money and you leave, and they have absolutely no control over getting you back in there.

You don’t have to give them your details of course. There shouldn’t be any pressure. They’re just asking the question. The old “would you like fries with that?” line. The message is – if you don’t ask, you don’t get.

So… how are you incentivizing people to come back to you?

Marketing Genius column

Key 3 Media marketing newsletter, Winter 2014

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