At age 36, I was categorized as obese, chronic inflammation, a pre-diabetic A1C, high cholesterol, difficult PCOS symptoms, less than optimal thyroid, dangerously low iron, chronic anemia, chronic hormonal imbalance, and many other uncomfortable symptoms.

As business owners and employees, some of us are so good at neglecting ourselves that we've sadly mastered it as an art. There I was, unable to tie my shoes, shortness of breath going upstairs, zero energy, and unable to lose a single pound. 

Something had to change, and it did. I started treatment with a fantastic naturopath. At age 37, I'm happy to share that out of those medical conditions and symptoms, only two remain a concern. 

Why does this matter in digital marketing? Because when my body was running on zero energy, I turned to automation to manage some tasks. I've never looked back. 

When we own a business, we need help and support. Sometimes, our budget does not...

Hey there,

Have you ever wondered how and why you get served certain ads on your feed? There is a science to it, but it is not as complicated as you think. 

 Here is your journey as a prospective customer: 

As you can see, your funnel must follow a sequence. Every time you start an ads funnel, you start with the top, the visit to your website. For your funnel to arrive at conversions, several steps must be completed by your audience member. Once you see the reminder on your feed of "complete your purchase," it is because you found yourself at the bottom of the funnel; you're ready to convert.  

How can you get more conversions? Start with a prospecting ad! Without a prospective audience, you cannot increase your sales. Your regulars will convert only so much. Of course, you could have email/SMS subscribers by now or previous visitors and shoppers, but those are no longer a cold or prospective audience; they are considered a warm audience...

Get this...

89% Of Marketers Still Use Email As Their Primary Channel.

Yes, you read that correctly. 

Even though we have countless online communication methods available to us today, including social media platforms, marketers are still using email as their primary channels!

Why? What makes email so effective to this day, even though it seems like an outdated technology?

Well, let's let the numbers talk:

- There are 4 Billion daily email users.

- 50% of people buy from marketing emails at least once a month.

- More than 8 out of 10 people will open a welcome email.

- 99% of email users check their inbox every day, with some checking 20 times a day. (I'm one of those).

- 74% of Baby Boomers think email is the most personal channel to receive communications from brands, followed by 72% of Gen X, 64% of Millennials, and 60% of Gen Z.

See? The entire world runs on emails, and that's because it allows businesses, brands, and entrepreneurs to form personal...

A new quarter always brings a unique feeling of a fresh start, but when you're in the digital marketing industry, it's easy to get overwhelmed with upcoming trends, ad costs, content, etc. 

Today, I'd like to focus on something that is ignored a lot, and that is the conversion rate. 

What is a conversion rate? "The conversion rate is the number of conversions divided by the total number of visitors. For example, if an e-commerce site receives 200 visitors in a month and has 50 sales, the conversion rate would be 50 divided by 200, or 25%." ~ Optimizely.com 

The conversion rate varies by industry and also by business. Being in the same industry as your business bestie does not guarantee you'll have the same conversion rate.

Why a low conversion rate?

Traffic is low

There's no product demand

Limited inventory *very important, more below*

 Your Website needs work, which is also essential! 

website not optimized for...

Have you ever wondered how some Facebook and Instagram pages get hundreds of likes with little to no followers? 

First, let's clarify that followers do not equal high sales. As business owners, we've been conditioned to believe that you need thousands of followers to make millions in sales. That is not true! It takes 100 engaged followers to start generating sales, so forget about hitting 1M followers with close to nothing engagement.

Followers have become a vanity metric for businesses and regular users; again, vanity metric! 

Let's go back to the number of likes and comments on small pages. Many businesses boost their posts, and that's how they get hundreds of likes. FYI, I have never opposed boosting. 

Five reasons why boosting posts is OK in my book:

  Let us test a cold, AKA prospecting audience, without putting it through the whole ads funnel. 

Boosting is less...

It sounds harsh, doesn't it? When we create Facebook Ads, we give them ads our all or think we are. We get so excited when running ads that we believe we will see a massive return instantly. We are making changes left and right without noticing because Sally and Karen told you what works for Facebook advertising. However, our friends Sally & Karen have far less experience than JLO singing live.

Don' take this personally, but here are ten ways of how we unintentionally hurt our Facebook ads + our social media pages' performance. 

YOU...

1. Only post one type of content vs. mixing different creatives.
2. Still, don't use videos in your content strategy; more on the video's relevance is below.
3. Edit the ads too soon 
4. Only boost posts vs. creating a comprehensive funnel. 
5. Select the wrong ad objective. 
6. Use the wrong budget (most of the time, too low of a budget). 
7. Don't leverage your existing warm audiences.
8. Use too many ad sets within an...

             Don't post without a plan!

Are you throwing everything at it and hoping it sticks? That's the strategy many of us have used in the past, and I don't blame you.
It's easier to post without a strategy, but the truth is that you need a clear plan to engage your audience.

Have you stopped posting for a while because you had no idea what to share? ME TOO!

Have you recycled your copywriting from the past because your creative juice is zero? ME TOO!

Have you paid someone to do your content and posting, and things didn't work out? ME TOO!
Maybe your assistant didn't understand your mission and vision; maybe the copywriting was too generic? I've been there too.

Here are some tips that I found helpful last month when I decided to take on the content creation task without looking back. The best part is that it didn't take me hours or weeks to craft good content!

 Pick a theme for the month: Yes, start with a theme. It's June as of today; a...

This blog post is about Reel #1 on Instagram. To watch it, please visit instagram.com/socialretailmarketingceo

Before running ads, I highly suggest verifying your Business Manager account and enabling an extra protection layer. 

Facebook Business Manager is a one-stop hub for all your Facebook Marketing needs. There, you can manage your assets such as: 

Ads Account

Pixel 

Catalog 

Commerce Account 

Instagram Account

Resources: 

Verify Your Business in Business Manager

https://www.facebook.com/business/help/2058515294227817?id=180505742745347

How to Turn On the Two-Factor Authentication Requirement in Your Business Manager

https://www.facebook.com/business/help/280940009201586?id=199156230960298

Verify Your Domain in Business Manager

https://www.facebook.com/business/help/321167023127050