Marketing School | Digital Marketing | Online Marketing

In Episode #189, Eric and Neil discuss how to increase your e-commerce conversion rate. Tune it to learn valuable tips and strategies to make the online buying experience as positive and streamlined as possible. From ensuring that there are product reviews to offering free shipping, Eric and Neil disclose the tricks of the trade that are easy to implement and will increase your sales. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: How to Increase Your E-commerce Conversion Rate 00:41 – First, add live chat to your web pages 01:03 – Use a 2-step check-out 01:12 – Name and email on the first page, then credit card details on the second 01:25 – Have a countdown timer on the checkout page 01:34 – Learn more about it in Conversion Excel 01:47 – Offer FREE shipping 02:12 – Increase the product cost to cover the free shipping fee 02:26 – Your page speed matters a lot 02:47 – Site speed means better user experience 02:57 – Make sure your site is mobile compatible 03:20 – Have reviews 03:41

In Episode #188, Eric and Neil discuss the 7 copywriting hacks that will double your conversions. What makes great copy? How do you fine tune your text to get people to convert? Tune in to learn some quick hacks that are tested and proven to boost your conversion rates this year. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: 7 Copywriting Hacks that Will Double Your Conversions 00:35 – First, within your headlines, consider integrating the city 00:40 – Use MaxMind which is an IP service that’ll integrate the person’s city 01:13 – Second, use specific statistics and numbers 01:07 – Check Quick Sprout or Neil Patel in BuzzSumo 02:08 – Third, copywriting is about answering objections 02:29 – Find out people’s objections by asking pointed questions and answer their objections in your copy 02:50 – Fourth, include the person’s name inside the copy when it’s relevant 03:14 – Fifth is to show vulnerability 03:20 – Neil showed how he made mistakes and how he fixed them 04:20 – Include all e

In Episode #187, Eric and Neil discuss the 7 unconventional marketing tactics that you can use for 2017. Tune in to hear what tactics are trending today and the online resources that can get you to speed. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: 7 Unconventional Marketing Tactics that You Can Use for 2017 00:35 – First, check out Russell Brunson’s ClickFunnels 00:56 – Soon, more and more businesses are going to do funnels 01:19 – Second, website personalization 01:21 – Hubspot provides you these options to personalize 01:53 – Third, try micro-retargeting 02:41 – Connect Leads can help you segment your Facebook retargeting 03:30 – Fourth, branding 04:05 – Gary Vaynerchuk is really gaining traffic 04:43 – Branding creates more business opportunities in the long run 04:53 – Google Trends can tell you a brand’s information 05:13 – Fifth, chat is becoming a great marketing tool 06:00 – Intercom and Drift are good tools to look up 06:14 – Sixth, work on your notifications 07:0

In Episode #186, Eric and Neil discuss if Twitter is still worth using. Tune in to find out if Twitter is really dead and what alternatives you can use to effectively increase your traffic. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: Is Twitter Still Worth Using? 00:35 – Eric doesn’t use Twitter to engage with people 00:46 – Eric searches Twitter to find out what people are looking for on this platform 01:00 – Eric follows venture capitalists, founders, and SEOs 01:11 – Twitbot’s integration is useful for Eric to read news later 02:00 – “I wouldn’t use Twitter. It’s dead.” 02:27 – Neil’s number of followers is much bigger than the traffic he’s getting 02:47 – Neil’s Facebook traffic is 244K from his fan page 03:10 – Neil’s Twitter traffic is just 2% of his followers while he gets 38% traffic from Facebook 04:43 – Twitter is a waste of time to generate traffic 04:51 – Twitter is still relevant for content ideas 05:00 – You can now livestream for your Twitter app 05:28 – “Facebook is crushing

In Episode #185, Eric and Neil discuss the 7 ways you can get more engagement on social media. Tune in to learn some tips and tricks to grow your audience as well as some useful online tools that you can use to optimize engagement. It’s not just about growing your audience, but getting the RIGHT people to your website to boost that engagement. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: 7 Ways to Get More Engagement on Social Media 00:35 – First, go LIVE 00:47 – Instagram and Facebook are giving more priority to those who are live 00:55 – Second, repost content that did well after a month of posting 01:12 – Neil just reposted content and is doing well 01:30 – Third, Tag the people in your post 01:49 – Hashtagify can help you find the top hashtags on Instagram 02:05 – Fourth, build a community 02:18 – Interact and engage with people 02:35 – Fifth, make sure you’re scheduling at the right time 02:52 – Sixth, target the right audience 03:20 – Create a fan page in Facebook to know wh

In Episode #184, Eric and Neil discuss what you should do when your business stops growing. There are many different solutions and options you can explore before deciding to throw the towel. Tune in to find out what Eric and Neil used as solutions when their own businesses were struggling and how an outsider’s perspective can make all the difference in saving your business. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:30 – Today’s topic: What Should You Do When Your Business Stops Growing? 00:45 – First, look at your analytics and numbers and see what’s going on 00:53 – Are you losing traffic? Assess, then look at the actions you should take 02:00 – Do your due diligence, don’t necessarily give up 02:20 – Look at other businesses and see how they are growing, learn from them 03:37 – Sometimes you’re too close minded about your processes 04:00 – Neil shares an example from his own personal experience 04:14 – One small change like changing URL structure, does make the difference to growing your traffic 05:17 – The

In Episode #183, Eric and Neil discuss when you should give up on a marketing campaign. Tune in to find out if it is the right time to give up your current marketing campaign or whether it’s time to just pause it. Neil also shares from his own personal experience with spending on branding and how his return on investment didn’t come until years later. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: When Is It Time to Give Up on a Marketing Campaign? 00:58 – Have specific goals, objectives, and have a timeline 01:05 – Set your smart goal, initially 01:18 – Have the right mindset 01:36 – If a marketing campaign doesn’t work at first, you can pause it and not shut it down 02:06 – Neil had spent on branding, but it wasn’t generating money 02:30 – After 6 years, Neil is now getting a big ROI from branding 03:15 – Paid acquisition is a short term campaign where you should get a ROI in just a few months 04:05 – Marketing requires reiteration 04:30 – The traction of YouTube ads 05:25 – Always put a ti

In Episode #182, Eric and Neil discuss how you can effectively integrate design into your marketing collateral. Tune in to discover just how important design is in your marketing campaign and why you need to be more careful in picking the right design. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: How to Effectively Integrate Design Into Your Marketing Collateral 01:00 – “Design shouldn’t just be used to make things look pretty, it should have a purpose. The purpose should be to help emphasize the message you’re trying to make and drive sales and conversion.” 01:15 – Having a styling guide will help you to be consistent 01:47 – Check Dribbble to get ideas from different portfolios 01:58 – Intercom is consistent in having a good-looking design 02:26 – “Make your designs very simplistic. Designs that are too overwhelming tend to not convert well” 02:35 – Make sure the text is legible and dark in color for easier reading 02:49 – “Text impacts conversion more than anything else” 02:58 – “Make t

In Episode #181, Eric and Neil discuss what kind of videos you should be creating when doing live streaming. They also delve into what interests viewers in terms of content and how you should carry yourself in your videos. Tune in to get some practical advice on how to connect with your viewers and make those conversions—in other words, how to make a successful video. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: Live Streaming 101: What Kind of Videos Should You Be Creating? 00:40 – “Behind the scenes” videos are always a way to get people watching 01:03 – Second, do a Q&A as it builds relationship and interaction with the viewers 01:20 – Third, try to do an interview—perhaps an impromptu interview 01:30 – With Facebook live, you can also invite others to join your live stream 01:40 – Fourth, check Gary Vaynerchuk and his short clips of advice and try to mimic him 01:52 – Make sure it is general advice related to your audience, that will really help them 02:15 – Fifth, do a product or service

In Episode #180, Eric and Neil discuss how you can get started with affiliate marketing. What is affiliate marketing and how can this benefit your brand and company? Tune in to find out how to be successful in affiliate marketing and the essential guidelines for setting it up.  Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: How to Get Started with Affiliate Marketing 00:35 – Affiliate marketing is performance marketing 01:10 – The commission will depend on the industry and products 01:39 – Affiliate marketing is getting other marketers to push your product 01:47 – Affiliate Marketing One Hour a Day by Evgenii Prussakov 02:06 – It’s about the traffic you can get and what you can promote that is relevant to the offer 02:52 – You can also do paid advertising 03:05 – Cheap traffic sources are Facebook and Pinterest 03:26 – LeadDyno and Getambassador are great tools 04:07 – Have specific guidelines set up so your brand won’t get destroyed by the affiliate 04:25 – Go to any popular affiliate netwo

In Episode #179, Eric and Neil discuss the type of content you should be creating when you can only blog one time a week. Tune in to learn how to make a blog that strikes its audience—and not just to read the blog—but compelling enough to share it, too! Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: What Type of Content Should You Create When You Can Only Blog 1x a Week? 00:39 – Neil was using Quick Sprout, just once a week 01:38 – You want to produce something that stands out and makes people want to link 01:49 – First, figure out who are you targeting and how you can help them 02:00 – Kissmetrics targets marketers 02:10 – Second, who are your ideal customers? 02:55 – Your content should be very specific 03:25 – Companies are looking at more detailed metrics 03:42 – Blogs should be actionable and thorough 04:00 – Groove HQ is a good example of a growing blog 05:08 – Help Scout blog posts are in-depth and well done, ranking 1 and 2 on Google 05:56 – Be specific and don’t go for volume; go fo

In Episode #178, Eric and Neil discuss how you can get sales and marketing to work together. Sales and marketing are a vital part of your company whose roles/tasks are mutually dependent on one another. Therefore, it’s wise to get these teams collaborating. Tune in to find out the benefits of having these two teams work together and how to streamline the communication process. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: How to Get Sales and Marketing to Work Together 00:48 – Get both teams together to brainstorm great content and blog post ideas 01:07 – Objections can also be answered and conversion rates can go up 01:14 – Collaboration is key and people like to work together 01:35 – “Most sales organizations are data driven” 02:15 – Automate as much as possible 02:19 – Improve and keep adjusting the funnel 02:40 – Analyze the presentation and be analytical 03:16 – Marketing can have a clear understanding of how they can help sales and sales should start closing more 03:25 – Use Amplemarket on

In Episode #177, Eric and Neil discuss the ideal URL structure for SEO. People often overlook the importance of their URL address and end up losing out on organic traffic. Tune in as Eric and Neil discuss how to clean up your URL and share their own experiences about how they improved their own URLs. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: The Ideal URL Structure for SEO 01:00 – Usual structure of a webpage explained 01:40 – Having a lot of categories on your URL makes it difficult for Google to crawl it 01:55 – For example: NeilPatel.com/makeup/allthemakeup 02:10 – The categories tell Google the topical relevancy 02:30 – Neil’s current URL structure 02:45 – There are a lot of titles and categories—this confuses Google, making it difficult to discern what category it should fall under 02:56 – Neil’s blog posts don’t rank as well as his guide 03:30 – URL should NOT be taken for granted 03:45 – Neil shares what he learned from his searches 03:52 – Less than 6% of results on page one of r

In Episode #176, Eric and Neil discuss how topical relevancy can boost your ranking. It’s important to know how your keywords and content work against and for you through Google’s ranking systems. Tune in to know how to master topical relevancy and how checking your competitors’ work can help you climb to a better rank. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 - Today’s topic: How Topical Relevancy Can Boost Your Ranking 00:34 – Topical relevancy allows the small guys to compete with the big guys 00:49 – Neil explains how Google ranks websites according to SEO relevancy 01:16 – SingleGrain ranks for marketing related keywords 01:43 – Google can’t seem to find the right keywords for Growth Everywhere which describes the stories of entrepreneurs 02:20 – It is important to have strong topical relevancy when starting your website 03:03 – Focus on a specific topic 03:35 – Being the best on one topic is what topical relevancy is about 04:20 – Marketmuse suggests all the phrases and terms that you should be u

In Episode #175, Eric and Neil discuss how to reduce your bounce rate. A bounce rate is the percentage of visitors to a particular website who navigate away after viewing only one page. Simply put—if your page is boring, people leave, and the higher your bounce rate. Tune in to learn practical ways to reduce your bounce rate so you can keep your visitors sticking around long enough to make that sale. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 - Today’s topic: How to Reduce Your Bounce Rate 00:33 – Bounce rate is when someone leaves your site right away 00:42 – The textbook definition of bounce rate: “the percentage of visitors to a particular website who navigate away after viewing only one page” 00:47 – A rising bounce rate is a sign that you have a boring homepage 01:16 – First, have a good design that keep people in your website 02:03 – Removing your pop-ups can decrease your bounce rate 02:26 – People are more likely to stay if your website doesn’t have loads of pop-ups 02:48 – You might need to check if it

In Episode #174, Eric and Neil discuss the two social media metrics that actually matter. These metrics are THE indicators that show whether or not your marketing strategy is working. Tune in to find out what they are and how to improve upon your ratings. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 – Today’s topic: Which Social Media Metrics Actually Matter? 00:44 – First metric is the engagement rate—the number of reach of your post divided by those who shared, commented, or liked your post 1:03 – Engagement rate is how effective your post is in social media 1:15 – You can check the engagement rate in Facebook insights or to some extent, in Youtube 1:38 – Neil shares that in social media, the more people are engaged, the more likely they will buy 1:40 – Engagement is not about the number of fans, but how they respond to your posts 1:53 – For example, HubSpot’s fan page in Facebook has over a million fans but they are not engaged 2:15 – Another tracking metric is the ROI 2:22 – Social media marketing cost

In Episode #173, Eric and Neil discuss how you can write a killer blog post. Many people can slap a string of coherent sentences together and call it a blog—but, can they capture their readers' attention? Tune in as Eric and Neil reveal solid suggestions for creating a blog that will entice and hook an audience. From your title to the images place amidst your text, all these details count.  Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 - Today’s topic: How to Write a Killer Blog Post 00:35 – Write a great headline and continue the thought in the first few sentences to hook the readers 00:59 – Go to Copyblogger for the headline formula 01:15 – Think of blogging as a presentation or a classroom lecture 01:33 – Engage with your readers 01:46 – Start with a conversation 01:57 – Neil shares a sample conversation in a blogpost 03:08 – Use sub-headers or bullets to keep things organized 03:45 – Eric shares an example that can get readers hooked 04:08 – Add media to your blog post 04:32 – Eric uses DesignPickl

In Episode #172, Eric and Neil discuss how you can keep your users engaged with your video. Videos are becoming a more common way in which we share content, so how do you know if you’re doing it right? Tune in to find out some practical tips and online applications that help make your videos more engaging—and the more engaging the video, the more viewers and conversions! Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 - Today’s topic: How to Keep Your Users Engaged with Your Video 00:39 – In 2020, most content will be in video 00:46 – Live videos have become popular and the number of viewers have doubled 01:10 – Keeping your videos short can help you have a high view count, but lower conversion rate 01:28 – First, try to make your video like a story 01:45 – Think about yourself watching a movie 02:13 – “The more storytelling you do—the more emotions you leverage, the more hooks you create, the more sales you end up generating from those videos” 02:30 – Start with a video transcription or caption 02:43 – Rev has

In Episode #171, Eric and Neil discuss the 7 age-old advertising principles that are still relevant and effective to this day. Tune in to learn how the big companies like Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, and AT&T are still winning in the advertising world because of these key principles that you can start using today. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 - Today’s topic: 7 Age-Old Advertising Principles that Are Still Relevant Today 00:36 – First, write a great headline 01:08 – Warren Buffett tells his CEOs to always protect their brand 01:22 – Branding is everything and just one mistake could ruin everything 01:43 – Third, tell a story 01:45 – Stories or advertorials drive people and evokes their emotions 02:21 – Fourth, consistency in advertising, regardless of how large your company is or how well-known 02:48 – The Rule of Seven explained 03:10 – Fifth is from 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing, by Al Ries and Jack Trout: 03:41 – The “first mover advantage” 04:18 – Sixth is from Don’t Make Me Think

In Episode #170, Eric and Neil discuss 7 advanced marketing automation tactics for your blog. Marketing automation allows you to know your subscribers better and respond to their behavior. Tune in to learn how advanced marketing automation can be very helpful for your blog and what to do with those unopened emails. Time Stamped Show Notes: 00:27 - Today’s topic: 7 Advanced Marketing Automation Tactics for Your Blog 00:36 – Marketing automation is how you market and send messages to people according to their behavior on your site 01:05 – First, on your thank you or intro email, add three different links for people to see what kind of people they are (ex. are you a beginner, intermediate, or advanced online marketer?) 01:52 – Neil shares what he learns through automation if people are opening your email, your open rate goes up 02:21 – If someone isn’t opening for 5 times on a paid email, take the person off the list 02:55 – Third, make sure you have a list or campaign that specifically targets your c