A great visual strategy plays a crucial role in amplifying engagement with your social media audience. If you want to get more from all your social media activities on Facebook, Pinterest, and Twitter, utilizing eye-catching image strategies is the best place to start.

According to a recent HubSpot study, a status update on Facebook that comes with an appropriate image generates 53% more engagement or response from fans or friends. This same technique also applies to other popular social media platforms like Twitter, Tumblr, and most especially, Pinterest.

With that said, if you are already integrating this strategy into your social media updates, you are on the right track. If not, then you should definitely consider doing it starting with the three proven image strategies below.

1. Tweetable

When you update Twitter or Facebook in the morning, or whenever you manage your social media during the day, use a tweetable image that goes along with your message. You will more likely get more Retweets, Likes or Shares from your followers and friends.

Creating a tweetable image is fun and easy to do once you get into it. You just need a nice image, then a message or an inspiring quote that you can add unto the image using the Paint tool on your computer, or Photoshop, or other photo editing tools.

If you have designing skills, you can come up with your own design rather than just grabbing and recycling existing photos from the web.

2. Sneak peek image

You have to always remember that the people on social media are primarily using it to have fun and connect with their family members and friends. They also use it to interact with other people they admire or care about.

A sneak peek image about what you’re doing right now in your business, offers you a great way to connect with your fans and followers on Twitter and Facebook on a more personal level.

3. Call-to-action image

Don’t just tell your fans or followers to do this or that. Be more creative when showing them the steps you want them to do - use  an eye-catching image as your call-to-action. Post an image that asks your friends and followers to share, comment or like.

Start treating your target audience with great social media images today! For all your social media management needs, contact us now!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michelle Christie is a business consultant based in Westchester, New York. She focuses on helping small business owners harness the power of social media to build and strengthen the relationship with their customers online. Michelle is the founder of Motivators and Creators Women's Group a professional membership organization for new and established business women interested in business networking, learning and achieving positive business results.

Stay connected with Michelle on:

Many business owners spend a lot of their marketing budget pursuing new customers relentlessly. They are so busy marketing their brand, meeting new clients and creating new products that they tend to neglect those little things that can also make a huge impact on business growth.

At MACs Women’s Group, we encourage each and everyone to pay a little bit more attention to seemingly insignificant aspects of their business that can make a huge difference in sales and repeat business ratios.

Here are the six of them:

1. Show appreciation

Be appreciative and lavish with praise not only to customers, but also to the people working on your team. Let them know they play a very significant part of your success. Show them how much you appreciate their decision for choosing your business, especially for their ongoing patronage and support.

Sending them a simple yet heartfelt ‘thank you’ email would be a good start.

2. Encourage feedback

Entrepreneurs love to talk more than to listen. If you want to sell more and get the most of every client-facing opportunity, listen more and gain a better understanding of your customer’s perspective.

Encourage feedback from customers. Ask them about their experience using your business, and what you can do to offer a much better product or service in the future.

3. Be proactive

You can’t, of course, please everyone, which is completely fine. As Bill Cosby says: "I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody." Whenever someone contacts you to express unhappiness or dissatisfaction after using your business, stay proactive. This way you will be able to see every complaint as an opportunity to improve on a product/service or as a customer service learning experience.

Take note of particular things that have caused dissatisfaction in your clients. Correct the problem and make necessary improvements.

4. Offer a great customer experience

Again, the best example when it comes to offering great customer experience is Zappos. The company really puts into action its “delivering happiness” mantra with tremendous success.

Customers love them and talk about their great online shopping experience to their family and friends, resulting in more potential buyers checking out their online business.

Use user-friendly language and simplify the buying process on your website. The easier it is for customers to do business with you online, the more likely they will buy from you or refer your business to others.

5. Keep customers happy

If you offer real value and deliver on your promise, customers will be happy and satisfied. And when they are happy and satisfied, you will, in effect, attract more people to your business. Another great thing with keeping your customers happy is that it could significantly impact your repeat business ratios.

6. Motivate your team

Meet with your team regularly. Share your short-term and long-term goals with them. Recognize their contribution to your business growth and provide appropriate compensation for their hard work.

Final thoughts

Progressive female entrepreneurs always look for creative ways to grow their business. Ideally, they want to run a business that offers the best product or service to customers, going beyond what the competitors are offering.

Get started today by taking those simple steps everyday that can hugely impact the profitable growth of your online business!

The marketing guru, Seth Godin, once said that if you want to succeed right now, you have to be remarkable. With today’s level of competition, especially on the internet, with everybody hustling for everybody’s attention, you can’t afford not to stand out from the rest of the crowd.

If you want to beat the competition, strive for uniqueness and be memorable to your target audience. Because if you don’t, Seth Godin added, your target audience will go to someone else who is.

Yet again, standing out online is easier said than done. That’s when business motivators like Seth Godin and MACS Women’s Group come into the picture. We are here to help you become more successful in business.

That said, here are four proven ways that could make your online small business a lot better than your competitors.

Know what makes you stand out
All businesses, in some ways, are unique. If you’re building a strong presence online, whether you’re offering a service or selling a product, the first crucial step to take is to determine what makes your business unique from others, and then milk it.

Women entrepreneurs who recognize that early in their business become more successful, and eventually separate themselves from the pack.

Establish your brand
Be specific about who you are. Do you want to establish a brand known for motivating and offering innovative resource for progressive business women? That’s us, the MACS Women’s Group.

Want your company to be known for its impeccable online customer service? Be like Zappos.

Or do you want your business organization to hold that special distinction for treating their customers with compassion? Then be like L.L. Bean.

How your target market perceives your business will create your own unique marketing story, which you can then use to your advantage.

Offer a high-perceived value proposition
Show customers what real benefits they get from using your business, most preferably those huge benefits that they don’t get from your competitors. Be creative with your selling proposition, and you will more likely attract more potential customers to buy from you.

Be everywhere
Everyone knows Donald Trump, right? Okay, somebody from Nunavuk, Canada, doesn’t know him. But you will never know. Even his hair is now very famous. If the Trump has new business projects, people will immediately know about it.

Goes without saying, the Trump brand is almost everywhere – offline and online. You may like or not like Donald Trump. By the “Be everywhere” strategy he’s known for surely  works like magic.

So what’s stopping you from utilizing all the tools available at your disposal to connect to your market? 

Start reaching out to your target audience using different social media channels. Harness the viral power of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and other popular social media. Create some buzz about your products or services.

Kickstart the growth of your online small business today! Need support and implementation options, we have social media solutions to help you grow and MACs-imize your brand using social media. Click here for investment options. 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michelle Christie is a business consultant based in Westchester, New York. She focuses on helping small business owners harness the power of social media to build and strengthen the relationship with their customers online. Michelle is the founder of Motivators and Creators Women's Group a professional membership organization for new and established business women interested in business networking, learning and achieving positive business results.

Stay connected with Michelle on:

Sufficient research is one of the crucial keys to a successful business. Even an all-inclusive and well-budgeted campaign can fail if you don’t have an in-depth understanding of your target market, your competitors, and the current industry trends.

Here are some tips on how you can gain a better understanding of your market and competitors:

Heap on research

From identifying your top competitors to determining the most effective method to reach your target customers, investing in market research can have a significant impact on the overall growth and success of your business.

You can do market research through:

• Market surveys (both online and offline)
• Attending business events and conferences
• Observation of industry trends and patterns
• Reading industry publications
• Surfing the internet
• Becoming a member of a business organization
• Joining social organizations where your target audience are members of
• Employing a third party agency that specializes in market research and surveys to do the research for you

You can try different research methods and then choose one that gives you the best possible outcome. Ultimately, the information and data you gathered can be used as the framework of all your marketing campaigns.

Check out your competition

Know who your competitors are and what they’re doing, what they’re offering and how they do their sales process.Take note of the things that make them standout and do something to make yours unique and/or better.

Here are some questions that can help you assess your competitors:

• Are the products they’re offering of higher quality?
• Do they have excellent customer service?
• Are their marketing campaigns more attractive?
• Are their prices significantly lower?

You must compare your business to theirs and find out whether there are things that you can improve on. These kinds of information can surely get you fired up!

Learn from the experience of others

Real experiences from successful entrepreneurs can help you be more prepared when you’re finally in the field. Find out who are the respected business experts and role models in your industry. Read about them, and learn how they do it.

Your sources can include:

• Business media
• Top entrepreneurs today who were able to make their ideas happen
• Marketers and business specialists who know what they’re doing
• Successful business owners belonging to the same industry as yours

Borrow their best ideas and decide on how you can best utilize them for your business.

The more you know about your target market & competitors, the more effective your marketing efforts will be.

Do you already have a small business lead generation campaign in place? If you haven’t got a plan laid out yet, I suggest you get started now. Below are 5 top tips to help you get started.

1. Always stay hungry for new customers
   
   Remember that your ultimate goal is to grow your business. You can’t realize this if you just rely on existing customers. Create more business opportunities by investing in marketing plans and online lead generation campaigns that are focused on getting new clients. 
   
   
2. Always come up with strong and fresh marketing message
   
   Do not use last year’s marketing message word for word. You can recycle marketing copies that worked, but make sure to kick in some extra lines or two to make them sound fresh and new to your customers. 
   
   
3. Stand out
   
   You have to make sure that potential customers remember your business brand or the company itself.  Find creative ways that would make the name of your business stick to your customer’s mind. One way to do this is by offering them quality content that's of value to them, maybe it's an informative article on how they can improve their business or a shareable social media material that they can easily grab and share to their network.
   
   
4. Never forget your call-to-actions
   
   Your call-to-action is the gold magnet of your website. You have to tactfully direct your customers to do whatever it is you want them to do – sign up for membership, buy your products, register for services, etc. The point is, get them to act!
   
   
5. Walk the talk
   
   Don’t just tell your customers why they should continue buying your products or using your services, show them. Give them solid proof why doing business with you is a smart choice.

Final Thoughts

Lay out your marketing and online lead generation plans carefully and make 2013 the best year for your business. Start filling your sales pipeline. Get cracking!

As business women, we need to be prepared. Preparing for a conference is no different and can optimize your experience because you are well-equipped and ready to make the most of the day. Below are three things that you should do to prepare for the MACs Women's Entrepreneur Summit! 

1. Order Business Cards.
If you have a specific promotion that your company is running or would like your new contacts to know something specific, take the opportunity to print it on the back of your business card. Promote yourself and your business all at once.

2. Connect on Social Media.
Use the hashtags for the MACsWomen Summit #MACsSummit or #MACsChat and begin introducing yourself. I am attending the #MACsSummit ! Looking forward to meeting you there! (Click to tweet!)

3. Practice your elevator pitch.
At conferences you often spend a lot of time introducing yourself and explaining what you do. Practice your three-minute elevator speech. 
Know exactly why you chose to attend the event, what your goals and interests are and the business that you are in. Also have an idea of what you hope to gain from your new relationships. Are you looking for customers? Mentor? or just Contacts? The kinds of relationships you are looking to build will affect the way you develop and deliver your elevator speech. Keep your end goal in mind always. 

The MACs Women Summit is June 8, 2013 in New York. Visit our website for more information or follow the conversation on Twitter: #MACsSummit or #MACsChat

Many women entrepreneurs shell out a lot of money to generate leads from the internet. Some of them invest in online advertising or other internet technology to obtain new leads. Others buy an extensive prospects list for massive email marketing. But, as many of us know, this kind of scattershot approach isn’t only costly but also doesn’t guarantee desired results.

If you’re out looking for creative ways to improve the sales performance of your website, read on below our six ways to get more leads from your online business.

Optimize your landing pages

If you want to succeed online, be sure to create well-optimized landing pages. Write quality content replete with the right keywords for the search engines, and a clear “call to action.” These are the crucial elements that will help define your online success.

Follow-through as soon as possible

Fast response is the key when it comes to running a profitable online business. In a study conducted by the Harvard Business Review, they found out that companies who immediately responded to a query within one hour are seven times more likely to turn it into something profitable, than companies who responded to a query one hour later.

With that in mind, whenever you have verified a lead, it would be wise to schedule a follow-up right away.

Utilize the power of social media

The top social media networks today such as Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest don’t just offer a great way to generate high value leads, but also provide us a perfect vehicle to get the word out in the market or spread out ideas faster.

So what’s stopping you from putting a Facebook or Twitter share button on your web pages? Or how about hiring a good social media management service to do the job for you?

Make it easier for your audience to talk about your brand and share your information about your business to other people.

Start blogging

Integrate a blog into your website, which according to a HubSpot study can gain you 68% more sales leads. With a blog, you will be able to communicate with your target audience on a more personal level, allowing you to establish rapport that is sure to go a long way in your business.

Nurture leads

Qualify each lead that comes your way. Then focus more of your time on the high-converting ones. Nurture them over time and find ways to stay connected with each one of them. Remember it’s all about building trust and positioning yourself as the go-to person or supplier once they are ready to buy.

Keep closing

As that famous line of the Glengarry Glen Ross film goes: “Always be closing.” When a potential customer contacts you and shows interest in your product or service, be there for them to answer their questions or clarify their doubts.

Closing the sale is the culmination of all the work and efforts you put in. So keep closing.

Final thoughts

Creating a website that yields desired results is an ongoing process. Start with those tips above and you will be amazed at the response you get.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michelle Christie is a business consultant based in Westchester, New York. She focuses on helping small business owners harness the power of social media to build and strengthen the relationship with their customers online. Michelle is the founder of Motivators and Creators Women's Group a professional membership organization for new and established business women interested in business networking, learning and achieving positive business results.

Stay connected with Michelle on:

Maybe you have experienced a moment or two as a business woman where you fleetingly  second guessed an updated that you shared on social media or that opinionated article you wrote and published on your blog. Well, here's the first good news, you have a blog and you are openly sharing from your perspective! 

So many business women I come in contact with; {nonjudgmental feedback here} whether they are clients of mine or other professional women I connect with through business networking, cringe at the thought of incorporating a blog on the website. Many women entrepreneurs still aren't blogging and unfortunately are losing out on valuable web traffic. See our social media solutions for busy business women.                                                                                 

Below are a few of the most common objections I have heard, first-hand, from women entrepreneurs. I have taken this opportunity, since I am a business woman who blogs, to share my expert opinion on how to overlook these limiting objection. 

Fear of What Others Might Think: 
This has to be the the most common objection I hear from women entrepreneurs as to why they aren't blogging.  What if my readers don't like what I write about? Why would they want to hear from me?... Here's what I say: Yes, your audience wants to hear from you and even if you feel a bit of fear and anxiety about being so transparent, do it anyway and take the good with the bad. At the end of the day, you define who you are! "It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves." ~ Edmund Hillary {Click to tweet} 


I Don't Know What To Write About:
The way you do business is unique to you, notwithstanding standard business principles.  
Your industry may not be unique, but you are! Write about your industry from your educated perspective  Here's some more good news, once you start writing, ideas will usually flow. Sometimes you can flesh out an entire series of articles while writing -- time for the idea book. So, to get started, find inspiration from your industry publications to get your creative juices flowing and begin writing!  Other great places to find inspiration include business books, podcasts and your own experiences as a business woman. "Lessons learned, Wisdom Earned" {Click to Tweet} 

Okay, I Being Blogging, What's Next? 
Leverage your posts. As women entrepreneurs who write articles you should then be leveraging those articles on social media. This means sharing your articles on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest and in article databases, these are excellent ways to drive traffic back to your website. Remember, getting targeted traffic (people who are looking for the solutions your business offers) is one of the top reasons why you should be blogging for your business. Incorporate social media marketing to increase the visibility of your brand {Click to tweet} 

So, to wrap it into a few words, blogging helps to tremendously improve the reach of your business online.  Overlook those limiting beliefs and begin blogging, you will find that more people will appreciate your point of view than you know and more importantly, blogging is a winning creative outlet for you as a business woman; when leveraged across social media channels, it can drive targeted traffic back to your website. 

Michelle Christie is a business consultant based in Westchester, New York. She focuses on helping small business owners harness the power of social media to build and strengthen the relationship with their customers online. Michelle is the founder of Motivators and Creators Women's Group a professional membership organization for new and established business women interested in business networking, learning and achieving positive business results. www.macswomen.com

Stay connected with Michelle on:

Far too often I see business women using twitter and not thinking strategically. Whether you currently have a bazillion followers or a modest clan is irrelevant; every business woman using Twitter needs a plan in place that effectively supports her brand. 

So, what does that mean? It really comes down to putting a social media marketing strategy  in place for your business. One tip to help you attract the right followers on Twitter is to make your tweets count; make them 'retweetable'.  (Read More)

Another tip is to define who it is that you are speaking to. Using hastags and following influencers in your industry are also strategies that will help to get your content out to the right audience. 

Sharing personal tweets are fine; after-all it is 'social' media and this solidifies that you are human =); it humanizes your brand; still think about the personal content you are sharing. Another Twitter tip to potentially gain you more followers, especially while you are offline, lets say at the end of each day, is to make your last tweet of the day count by posting a tip; blog post with link or retweet an influencer in your industry who shares good content -- something that is of interest to your ideal audience that might get you more followers and/or retweets.  

More Twitter Tips for Business Women

1. Use a conversational tone to connect with your audience.
   
2. Incorporate a mix in your tweets to Include links, pictures and videos.
3. Tweet consistently and reply in a timely fashion -- a crucial element for twitter success. 
4. Keep Tweets short and sweet. According to Buddy media, tweets shorter than 100 characters get a 17% higher engagement rate. For example:Twitter Tips! (Click to tweet)
5. Tweet in real-time. How cool is it receive live tweets about an event that is happening in real time or to tweet from a live event?... Pretty cool! 
   
6. Follow your business interests. Following accounts in your industry is a fantastic way to discover compelling content and inspire ideas for your own tweets. Follow accounts that are interesting to you or your business. 
7. Initiate Engagement with a simple @reply. Engage other Twitter users in conversation using @replies and mentions. This simple feature makes it easy to communicate with other Twitter users. 

Putting a strategy in place that will MACs-Imize your business presence on Twitter is essential for your social media marketing success. Through our social media management solutions, we help clients create winning strategies for marketing their businesses online by increasing their brand awareness and bridging the gap between fans and paying clients.  Women in business who are not monetizing social media are leaving money on the table. Work with us and let us help you develop and implement a winning strategy to monetize your social media marketing. Sign up for our service now and begin. 

Michelle Christie is a business consultant based in Westchester, New York. She focuses on helping small business owners harness the power of social media to build and strengthen the relationship with their customers online. Michelle is the founder of Motivators and Creators Women's Group a professional membership organization for new and established business women interested in business networking, learning and achieving positive business results. www.macswomen.com

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