LinkedIn networking

Key to success – focus on one thing

In a recent interview with the BBC the co-founder of LinkedIn gives insight into the secret to success for start-ups – “focus on one thing”.  

Allen Blue said: “Focus your team. Your team can be tremendously creative and innovative, but only if you define the problem they’re trying to solve as narrowly as possible. 

This is invaluable advice for companies wanting to grow their business. It’s important to harness the expertise of the whole team when brainstorming. By constantly looking at ways to solve a problem you will bank other ideas that will help your firm in the long run. So, be open to suggestions but all the time remember that keeping focus on what you are trying to achieve will help you reach a solution faster and improve efficiency.  

Solving problems is also about growing your network, which is what LinkedIn is all about and why it came about. This business social media platform is a great way to debate, share and solve solutions. Whether that’s to engage with people you meet at networking events or through the myriad of groups available on LinkedIn. Or perhaps you want to use it to share your tips and advice as part of your marketing strategy to improve your SEO, LinkedIn increases your network and therefore your expertise as you have a knowledge base at your fingertips.  

Social media for your business 

If you haven’t already explored LinkedIn for your business, perhaps now is the time.  

There’s over 700 million LinkedIn members so it’s a significant social platform to tap into and a great way to continue conversation with a new business lead by asking if you can connect on LinkedIn.  

But when you are on this social platform and you’re completing your profile or sharing posts, just remember Allen’s advice to focus on one thing. This is a great reminder to target your marketing communication to your audience for successful brand awareness of your products and services.  

Watch the full interview with Allen Blue on the BBC.  

Digital marketing mix

We’re a digital marketing agency based in London and Croydon. If you need support for your online marketing plan, encompassing your social media strategy, then book a free consultation with us.

The aim is for your business to become a lead generation magnet which is why we recommend a mix and match approach to digital marketing. Following a review of your current marketing activity we’ll look at ways to improve SEO to help you rise in search engine rankings, work on your content marketing for your website and social media as well as implement any paid search as and when deemed necessary.

Social media resources 

Social Media

Benefits of social media for business

With constant change being the norm right now, businesses have a lot on their plate. Simply running your business from day to day, managing finances and keeping up to speed with government schemes to help out will certainly be taken up your time. That’s where marketing sometimes slips down the agenda, but it is a key activity to keep up so that you maintain your presence in the marketplace.  

It’s worth remembering that social media is a way for you to reach your audience and build brand awareness. We know that time is of the essence and that you don’t want it impacting on your day. So, we’ve gathered together some top tips on what to do to refresh your social media profile and then some tips for 5-minute daily tasks to keep your presence out there.  

Your profile 

It may seem obvious but is your social media profile up to date and have you completed all sections available to you? Always makes sure you have your website address, email, telephone number visible. On many social channels such as Facebook you can add in your opening times.  

Perhaps it’s also time to refresh the company bio. If you wrote it a while ago, does it still reflect the company you are today? Keep it simple and get across what you do.  

Are you on the right social media platforms? 

If you’re revisiting social media for the first time in a while, then now is a good time to review whether you are on the right channels. You may already be on Facebook and Instagram but what about a LinkedIn company profile? Including this activity in your social media strategy will help you concentrate your efforts moving forward.  

Conduct a little research with your customers to find out what channels are most popular and research which social media channels your competitors use.  

Content marketing

With social media you are talking directly to your target audience so make sure that what you post is relevant to them. Ultimately, it’s about posting your own content. If you write blog posts for your website, then use this content in bite size chunks across a number of social posts. Re-purposing your content is a great time saver. But again, if you don’t have time right now then here’s some tips on some ways to start posting and encouraging engagement with your audience: 

  • Re-sharing (retweet) articles of interest or social posts. Add a comment to it to place your own thoughts on the topic so you can be seen as a thought leader.  
  • Is it a national or international day of interest relevant to your business and your audience? Adding the relevant hashtags will help extend reach. 
  • Talk about company milestones. 
  • Do you have any new products or services to talk about? And, remind people about what you do offer.  
  • Run a special offer.   
  • Tips, stats, insight – all great sources of information.  

Weekday daily social media tasks 

Whatever social platform or platforms your business is on you need to keep on sharing content on a regular basis to remind people about your business. Here’s our tips on daily activity to help keep your feed populated with interesting and varied types of content. It’s about letting your followers know you are thinking of them.  

  • A one-off action is to create lists of favourite news feeds that you know always share interesting articles for your audience. Once you’ve done this, then each day dip into the lists and see if there is anything to share. 
  • Check notifications, have you been mentioned, or any posts highlighted? This is another quick way to see if there is anything interesting to share. It’s also a time to make sure whether there is any comments you need to respond to.  
  • A daily social media post about your services/products. 
  • If you are involved in any virtual events or participating in the Eat Out To Help Out initiative then talk about it.  

Marketing automation  

For a small business, it can be difficult to manage with everything else you have to juggle. So, marketing automation tools such as Hubspot can help you manage when you send social media messages with its social media scheduling capability. It means you can spend a bulk of time scheduling a month of social posts in advance.  

We’re a social media marketing agency and can help you formulate a social media campaign as part of your overall digital marketing strategy.  

Exploring Instagram for business

‘Eat out to help out’ marketing tips for Croydon establishments

From 3 August, the government’s Eat Out To help Out scheme will get underway. Restaurants, bars, pubs cafes – an establishment that provides an eat on site offer for diners – will be able to sign up to take part in the scheme. It means that on a Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday up until 31 August, diners can benefit from up to 50% off when eating or drinking soft drinks in participating places.

So, Croydon restaurants have you signed up to the scheme? If not, here’s the link to the details of what to do: Register your establishment for the Eat Out to Help Out Scheme.

But, once you are signed up, it’s important to spread the word. The government has promotional items you can utilise here.

At the moment, it may be less about passing trade as many people will be making plans first before going out. Therefore, while traditional marketing like signage in your restaurant window is important, we’ve got a few more online marketing tips you can implement swiftly to help spread your reach.

Social media

If you’ve not been doing much social media up until now, then now is the time to ramp up your presence with your social network.

Make sure you’re taking some fantastic shots of your amazing dishes and share on your social channels. Instagram and Facebook are great for foodie places. With Instagram it’s all about the look and there’s nothing more appealing than a plate of tasty food.

Make sure you tell people in your posts that you are part of the scheme. Give them an insight into your menu, anything new, your most popular dishes and your specials. Be descriptive with your post though. While a good image does say a thousand words, there’s no point posting a picture of a burger on your ‘specials’ menu that day which gives no indication of what’s in it. While you want engagement with people, try and make it a little easier for them to understand what’s in the picture in the first instance. This will help prevent you answering unnecessary questions – which can be time consuming and if not replied to in a timely manner could affect how people perceive you.   

Re-confirm your opening times and update your profile with any new details.

Extend reach of your post by adding hashtags. Here’s some general Croydon foodie hashtags you might want to consider as well as some standard ones you should always think about:

#Croydon #EastCroydonCool #Croydonbar #Croydonpub #Croydonrestaurants #Croydonfoodies #Croydonfood #Croydonrestaurantquarter #Instafood #lovefood #foodstagram #foodpic #foodie

Note: don’t forget to hashtag what your food is! So, if it’s burgers or pasta – well, I think you get the picture!

What’s the story?

Don’t forget to utilise the Story function on Instagram and Facebook. This is another way to be seen by your followers as it stands out at the top of the feed.

Encourage diners to share their visit on social media and take pictures of food. If you’re on social media have your social handle visible in your restaurant and tell diners about it.

When someone shares a post and tags you in, you can use the little arrow function just below the image. This allows you to share this to your stories and you can thank the customer for their visit.

To create a story from scratch just click on ‘your story’ upload an image, then use the text function ‘Aa’ and write a brief message. For this campaign you could say ‘Eat Out to Help Out. Book Now.’ Or perhaps describe what mouthwatering food is in your image.

Or a simple way to create a story is once you have added a post to your Instagram feed, just click that arrow below your post and you can share to you story.

You can also search for the Eat Out to Help Out gif to liven up your story post. When you’re in story mode just click the square face and explore.

Website updates

If you have a website, make sure that all your contact details and menus are up to date.

On the homepage make an update to say that you are part of the scheme and encourage people to make a booking with a bold call to action button.

If you have a blog, make sure you add content to that and do so regularly. This really helps with search engine optimisation and your business being found in search engines. Fresh content is great for ongoing organic rankings.

Google My Business  

Do you have a Google My Business page? If not, get one set up – it’s free! If you do have a page already then make sure all details are up to date. The last thing you want is an incorrect telephone number.

You can also add offers and updates to this page. So, tell people you are part of the discount scheme.

Remember to add imagery to your business page, this is a great resource for restaurants to showcase their dishes.

Remind diners to leave a review. Testimonials are a great way to encourage potential and returning customers.

Our blog, ‘have you told search engines you exist’ has tips about setting up your Google My Business page.

Email marketing

If you have an email distribution list, then now is a great time to start an email marketing campaign and distribute to potential customers on your database. Remember to be clear in your message, include a call to action to book now and ensure you have contact details visible.

Look at our blog on what to check before you send your next email marketing campaign – this has a checklist of what to run through before you send your email including you have a visible unsubscribe link. You must make sure you are GDPR compliant.

Digital marketing Croydon

We’re a digital marketing agency in Croydon. We know the stomping ground and we’re here to support you. We’ve got some additional marketing resources you might want to take a look at which cover the different types of digital platforms and online advertising to help you form a digital marketing plan.

Contact us for a free consultation if you want to chat further about the different digital options.

Using social media for inbound marketing

Why we love social media in Croydon

Safe to say that these past three months were not in any business plan or strategy for 2020. But up and down the country what we’ve seen is how communities have come together as we help family, neighbours and our local businesses. 

Croydon, like any other part of the UK, has come together to help the local business community. Social media has been prevalent in spreading messages of care, business support and #shoplocal to help get us through. 

Maintaining online presence  

At the start of lockdown, we continued to talk about the importance of businesses  maintaining online presence for continued brand awareness. Social media was the avenue of choice for many businesses. With the ongoing daily changes, it meant the ability to keep clients and prospects informed of updates quickly and in a timely manner. 

We’ve seen local hospitality and retail businesses really have to dig deep and adapt. And adapt they did. From bars and pubs full of customers to changing business model overnight to offer a takeaway service. But what social media has allowed is an army of local followers to keep spreading the word that it’s business as usual as can be at this time.  

The local community wants these businesses to thrive as we know that society will come out of hibernation like never before.  

Social media has helped us to stay connected, engage and spread the word.  

Community connected  

In a crisis such as this you often see pop-up businesses as quick-thinking entrepreneurs see a gap and they have the necessary skills to adapt and put out an offering in a super speedy fashion. You also see how community social media handles work out how they can serve the community better with creative social initiatives such as that set up by East Croydon Cool with its #Localslovelocally to encourage the community to support local businesses.

It’s this sense of community that makes us love social media in Croydon all the more. The immediacy of sharing our thoughts about latest business ventures, ordering from them, writing reviews, sharing posts about them online has given a sense of being in this together and support for all.

We’re looking forward to after 4 July to revisit the actual premises of hospitality businesses. What we know through our personal social media experience is that those entrepreneurs who may have had a tough time will be back and as with all the local community we will be looking out for them to help with reviews, word of mouth and sharing on social media channels such as Facebook and Instagram.   

Social media marketing agency 

If you’ve been looking to take your social media marketing to the next level, why not contact our digital marketing agency in Croydon?

As social media consultants, we can chat through the different social media platforms and digital marketing tactics available as you may find that a mix and match approach is best for your business. On an initial call with you, we’ll get to understand your business goals and your target audience so that we can tailor a digital marketing strategy that will generate leads for your business.  

We’re a digital marketing and social media agency based in London and Croydon, book a consultation today.