Top 5 Content Writing Tools for Your Small Business Website

by | Blog, Content Marketing, Contributed Post

***Contributed Post***

 

Content is king, you’ve heard it a million times. However, creating good content isn’t just about good writing, it implies a broad spectrum of technical elements that businesses need to take care of, in order to get better results from their content marketing efforts. 

To better address the technical aspects of content writing, business owners can use a broad spectrum of tools that will help them take into account SEO, readability, and a host of other essential elements that come with content writing. In this article, we’ll look into 5 top writing tools that small business websites can use to get a better effect from their content. 

  1. Hemingway

 If you’ve been researching the interdependence of SEO and content writing, you must have come across the Flesch-Kincaid scale or the concept of readability score.

The Flesch-Kincaid scale is a quantifiable score can give you some insight into how readable your text is, based on a predefined set of metrics that include the number of words per sentence, paragraph length, adverb density, and so forth. The truth is that in order to calculate a text’s score manually, you have to use a fairly intimidating formula. The good news is that Hemingway is there to help you out with that and give you content-related suggestions in real time that will help you make your text more readable. 

This app will allow you to make your text less intimidating by eliminating unnecessary words, expressions, and other linguistic obstacles. It’s up to you to decide what score is optimal for your particular niche or industry. Obviously, if your website sells very niche and highly technical tools and devices, it’s unreasonable to expect that you can adjust the readability score to the level of an eighth grader’s. However, if your niche allows it — make your texts informative and straightforward. 

  1. Yoast’s Content Analysis Tool

 As a freelance writer, you’ll very often have to abide by the latest SEO standards, which also implies that you have to keep an eye at the structure, word count, and other essential parameters that search engines like Google and Bing take into account when they index 

After you’ve written the first draft of your text, paste it to Yoast’s content analysis tool to receive suggestions on how to improve it, based on the latest search engine optimization standards. 

So, it’s important to take into account that Google and other major search engines analyze reading ease, so bear in mind that your writing shouldn’t be too complicated because, at the end of the day, it needs to suit a broad spectrum of readers. 

  1. WOWGrade

 WOWGrade is a very handy tool that allows you to delegate content creation to professional niche writers. The tool is also a lifesaver if you need to find high-quality editors that would go through the content you wrote and consult you on the stylistic and structural improvements you need to make in the future. 

The company has been around for quite a while and have quite an impressive list of corporate and individual clients. 

  1. Cliché Finder

 Cliché Finder is really helpful if you’re looking for stylistic consistency. Whether you’re writing a white paper, a blog entry, a press release — clichés can always find their way into our text. The problem with clichés is that they’re commonly useless lexically and they don’t really sound good either. 

You can just paste a text into the cliché finder, and it will highlight the clichés it has identified. 

  1. Grammarly

 Everybody knows about Grammarly. This service has been around for quite a while and has been continuously improving over the years. Basically speaking, Grammarly is there to ensure that all the texts that we write on a device are worded impeccably, from a syntactic, lexical, and stylistic perspective. Grammarly uses Machine Learning to gradually improve the service and also make better suggestions to the people using it. 

The technology behind this tool is designed to analyze millions of documents online and compares them to your semantic choices, which is how Grammarly is trained to give you suggestions on how to improve your text. The tool also scans your text for a broad spectrum of structural issues, which are fairly problematic. 

Grammarly is vital for the development of your business’s presence online because having grammatically sound is an indispensable component of search engine optimization, which in part defines your commercial success. 

Honorable mention 

Writefull — a fantastic tool that you can use for both article writing and interface copy. The tool accesses data from Google Web, Google News, and Google Scholar and provides you with the number of times a certain expression was used. If you’re not sure what the best choice of words is — you can always opt for this tool to check how often people have used a said expression or combination of words. 

Conclusion 

Many of us are talented when it comes to writing, but in the current business ecosystem, competition is fierce. This is why we need these writing tools to improve our style, word choice, and grammar at times. 

Author’s BIO: 

Linda Grandes is a full-time blogger at Studyton.com and a true expert in writing. She is interested in a variety of topics starting from education and ending at modern art. That`s why the idea of her blog cannot be narrowed to one topic as well.

 

 

10 Ways to Establish a Relationship with Customers

by | Blog, Contributed Post

***Contributing Post***

Establishing a relationship with your customers is vital for businesses in this day and age. However, thanks to the internet, it’s never been easier to get to know your customers. Whether it’s email, social media, blogs or more, your customers can see your every move. But, a relationship that stands the test of time can be difficult to hold on to. So, how do you create a lasting relationship?

Ask Your Customers 

One of the best ways to find out how to create a lasting relationship with your customers is to ask them how they would prefer to be contacted. Many people feel like phone calls are a hassle and would prefer to be texted. Some are more responsive to social media messages than emails. Creating a survey and asking your customers to take part is a great way to get the feedback you need. Not only can you figure out your customers needs via a survey, but you can also attract prospective customers to the business. 

Blogs 

In recent years, blogging has become ever more popular. For businesses, a blog is essential when it comes to connecting with customers. If your blog is relevant to your audience, it should be able to grasp their interest. Your customers engaging and responding to your blog is a great way to build a connection. How often you post and how long your posts are is entirely up to you and generally depends on the type of industry you’re in. For example, a photographer may want to keep posts to no more than a page in length, but a plastic surgery may need to go into more detail for their audience. 

Newsletters 

Newsletters have been a tried and tested method for bonding with customers for decades. From paper newsletters sent through the post to email newsletters that customers can subscribe to. Unfortunately, many people go through their emails and automatically delete them if they don’t instantly seem of interest. So, to grab the attention of your customers, your newsletter has to be worth reading. The title of the newsletter should be punchy and your articles should be intriguing. You should also be able to separate your target audience into categories so you can create something that will be of interest to each person reading. 

Email Response 

More than ever, people are looking for fast response and convenience. Customers want their queries answered at the drop of a hat, which is why so many businesses are investing in chat boxes on their websites. When customers receive a fast response, it goes a long way to impressing them. Impressed customers continue to buy products and refer friends and family to the business too. If you haven’t got time for this kind of response, you may want to invest in customer success software to give you insights instead.

Personalised Thank You 

It’s important to let your customers know they are valued. When customers feel like a statistic or unappreciated, there’s nothing stopping them from visiting your competitor. Sending a personalised thank you is a great way to let your customers know they are appreciated. Whether it’s a thank you discount via email or a personalised thank you card via snail mail, it’s always the thought that counts. As a customer, knowing that your thought about is all you need to continue using the business. 

Active Social Media 

Social media is one of the top chosen methods for customers to contact businesses. Without an active social media, it’s easy for customers to think you aren’t trustworthy or professional. It’s also one of the easiest ways to connect with your customers. You can keep the conversation going when you’re using social media, so gaining feedback or suggestions should be a constant. You can also use social media as a form of customer service, responding to good reviews or complaints quickly. It’s important to respond to any criticism so potential customers visiting the page know you’re willing to resolve problems.

 

Instagram 

Although Instagram falls under the category of social media, it’s a world of its own when it comes to connecting with customers. Many people haven’t got the time to read lengthy social media posts or blogs that businesses create. However, studies have shown that people sit up and take notice of images. So, posting images of new products, customers using products and offers, or discounts is the best way to grab your customers attention. You could even use images to go behind the scenes and show customers how your business is run and what you stand for. 

Webinars 

You may be putting all your effort into writing blog posts that just aren’t being picked up by the numbers you want. That may not be because your audience isn’t interested; it could just be they haven’t got the time or energy to put into reading a post. Hosting a webinar once a month is an ideal way to keep your audience engaged without them having to make too much effort. You could even invite a speaker well-known in your industry to make an appearance and talk to your audience on a particular subject. 

Train Your Staff 

Most business owners rely on their staff when it comes to making a lasting connection with customers. After all, it’s the staff that have the most contact with them. If your staff aren’t equipped with the right knowledge or haven’t got the answers to customers questions, it could mean a loss in sales. You have to empower your staff to make the connections with your audience. Whether it’s a social media manager or a sales person on the shop floor of a retail business, knowledge is power. 

Don’t Ignore Mobiles 

The majority of people have their phones within reach and sight all day, every day. Not making use of that statistic would be foolish. Make sure your emails are mobile friendly and you use text services to connect with your customers. Creating an app is also an ideal way to stay connected. 

Making sure your customers are happy is making sure you stay in business.

How to Effectively Set Goals as an Entrepreneur

by | Blog

Today we’re going to talk about goal setting as you know in business, you can’t get anywhere without goals. Goals of where you want to go, who you want to be, what you want to change, and more. To achieve reliable progress, you must have effective goals, which also requires effective goal setting.

Effective goal setting is that secret ingredient that can put one business miles ahead of its competitors!

As an entrepreneur, it can be difficult to determine what goals are appropriate to set, what to focus on, and how to move forward since everything feels important to you and your business.

5 tips for effective goal setting as an entrepreneur!

Be sure your goals align with your values.

You’re an entrepreneur. That means you should be doing something you enjoy. If your career goals aren’t supporting any of your life goals, then you’re bound to end up sad and somewhat miserable. Don’t work hard to open doors that will only lead you down paths you don’t want to be on. For instance, if you hate paperwork and sitting at a desk, then don’t set goals that will result in you having to spend all your time glued to these things. Don’t be afraid of chasing after what you like doing and setting goals that will align with your values and interests. Then work hard to accomplish it.

Don’t be afraid of thinking big.

We’re often wary of setting big goals because we don’t want to fall short of meeting them. The cool thing is, though, the larger your goal, the harder you’ll work to accomplish it, meaning the greater your reward will likely be. So what if you fall short? You’ll likely do so much better (or at least as well) with a big goal than you would have if that goal were small to begin with. For example, instead of setting a goal to make your first million, set it to make your first $20 million. Worst case scenario, you don’t meet $20 million, but you meet or even surpass $1 million!

Set goals that you have control over.

Now, setting big goals is great, but you have to remember that the smaller pieces matter, too. It’s all fine and dandy to set monetary goals, goals about how many people you will reach, and more, but be sure you don’t stop there. Set goals you actually have control over, such as how you will accomplish that monetary growth, what you will do to reach your goal number of people, and so on. Decide on all the little goals that will bring you to your big goal. Determine goals for each quarter, each month, each week, and so on to accomplish the big, uncontrollable goal. Make them bite-sized and manageable. Make sure they’re things you, yourself, are capable of accomplishing.

Give yourself enough time to do them.

Nothing kills a goal quite like rushing it. Don’t be discouraged when things take longer than anticipated since many things take a bit of time anyway. Be sure to give yourself that time to make progress and don’t be upset if things move slower than your impatience would like. Don’t expect to be an overnight success. Be willing to put in the hard work.

Manage the risks and have a plan for your success.

With any business, there are going to be risks. With any change, there are going to be possible mistakes or fall-backs. In the same way, success–even when pursued–brings its own collection of change and adjustment. Be sure you plan for these things and make adjustments accordingly.

Have you hit a plateau in your business? Ready to make some real progress? Let’s chat. I specialize in supporting entrepreneurs in reaching their goals through professional streamlining and organization. I have a few open spots each week to talk to motivated business owners! Are you one of them?

YES sign me up for a FREE business strategy consultation!

Have a great week.
Robyn Bennett

3 Important Ways Your Business Should Be Using Data

by | Blog, Contributed Post

***Contributors Post***

Modern businesses collect a huge amount of data about themselves and their customers. Whenever you have an interaction with a customer, regardless of the nature of that interaction, you’re storing some kind of data. You also have a wealth of data about your own business operations to draw on. But this data revolution has happened so fast that a lot of businesses don’t know how to effectively make use of it, which is a big problem. If you know how to utilize all of that data properly, it can bring about massive improvements to your business. If you haven’t put much thought into it before now, these are some of the most important ways that your business should be using that data.

Master Data 

One of the reasons that businesses struggle to manage and use the data that they hold is because there is simply so much of it and it’s spread all over the place. Most businesses have a lot of different software applications that they use. You’ll have one program that manages your marketing, one that manages sales, a different one for your accounts, and then you’ve got loads of emails and social media interactions as well. When your data is split between lots of different applications, it can be hard to use it to answer simple questions like, ‘which customers responded best to our recent marketing campaign.’ But if you can bring all of that data together, it’s a lot easier to use, that’s where master data comes in. A good master data management can bring information from all of those different applications together under some simple headings. For example, you can view all data that relates to your customers as a whole, which makes it easier to base decisions on it. It streamlines the process so you can start using that data to make improvements to the business. 

Targeted Marketing 

When you’re developing a marketing campaign, it’s important that you target it toward the right people. Data is such a big help here because it gives you such a good insight into your customer’s mindset. You can look at your previous campaigns and which aspects connected well with customers. When you’re trying to decide which digital marketing tools to use, knowing which of them offer a good return on investment and which don’t helps you to allocate resources effectively and reduces waste. 

Developing New Products 

The first step in developing a new product is identifying a gap that needs to be filled. You need a problem that you can create a solution for, and customer data can really help here. If you can see what kind of products your customers are buying from you and see where the gaps are, you can start developing new product lines to fill those gaps. You can look at social media posts and reviews of your products to see whether there are features or capabilities that people are asking for. You can also see which products aren’t connecting so well so you know what to avoid. Incorporating that data into your product design process will help you to create something that is more likely to resonate with customers. 

Data is one of the best tools that you have at your disposal so it’s important that you make sure that you’re taking full advantage of it.    

 

How To Promote Your Business With Webinars

by | Blog, Webinar

If you’re seeking a way to promote your business and reach bigger and better goals, then look no further… Webinars might be exactly what you need! 

Many different companies boast of the great effects that webinars have had in helping their business grow to new heights, so what’s stopping a great webinar from doing the exact same thing for your business? With some dedication, determination, education, and a bit of effort, you can create a brilliant webinar that will work wonders for your business.

Here are 6 ways a webinar can help you build your business and reach your 2019 goals. 

Build Your Lists

If you host a free webinar, one with valuable information that is easy for your desired audience to attend, then you will easily be able to build a fresh list of warm to hot leads! Always remember that your database of emails and other contacts is perhaps your most valuable business possession (besides yourself and your team) and a great webinar can help you multiply that list. This not only helps you to network, but also remember that if you can get your product or service in front of your desired audience, then you’re that much closer to making sales!

Find A New Audience 

Your current audience is an important thing to protect and serve dutifully. However, in order to grow your business, you must also grow your audience and customer base! Webinars can help you do exactly that. Attempting to create webinars in various industries or in front of various audiences can help you tap into new opportunities for business growth, all while keeping your current audience or customers satisfied with valuable information and their desired products or services.

Spread Brand Awareness 

It’s obviously important to build your lists and find your desired audience, but there might be a time where instead of hosting the actual webinar, you’re a guest speaker invited to bring additional value. Perhaps you’re a social media guru asked to speak at a marketing company’s telesummit. In that case, you want to present a lot of valuable information while also portraying what is unique and valuable about your specific brand in order to pique interest in what makes you special. Making sure your audience understands your uniqueness is important in growing your business and spreading your brand.

Perfect Your Craft 

Something you’ll quickly learn (if you start presenting yourself and your business more) is that each time you present, you will learn how to make the next presentation even better. Hosting a great, well-thought-out webinar will not only immediately help grow your business (new lists, new audience, new brand awareness), but it will also help you in future endeavors to reach new business goals since you’ll be far more confident in what you do and know.

Network Like A Boss 

A good webinar will also help you make connections with real people looking to make real improvements or changes in their own lives or trade (depending on your business and your audience). By creating an excellent webinar with valuable information, you’ll make it easy for people who are serious to reach out to you, make a connection, and keep that connection going. Since networking is such a crucial part to business, this point shouldn’t go unnoticed!

Save Time 

As a business owner, you have to be able to make the absolute most of your time if you’re going to be able to handle substantial growth. While speaking at live events definitely has its pros, webinars save the time of booking, travel, and are easily repeatable if needed. Additionally, you can create them within the comfort of your home without the pressure of a live audience. Perfecting your speech is easily done, even for those of us who are more shy or even terrified of presenting.

Ready to host a webinar? I can help! My team and I have been running successful webinars and telesummits for years and I am passionate about helping business owners reach their goals.

I’ve opened a few spots on my calendar this week for free, no-obligation consultations. Spaces fill quickly so claim your spot now!

Have a great week.
Robyn Bennett

 

Wrongs And Rights: Holding Up A Mirror To Our Business To Find The Weaknesses

by | Blog, Contributed Post

***Contributed Post***

When we are working at a side hustle or small business, it can take some time for us to find our feet. This is why we’ve got to find out what is wrong as soon as possible. Sometimes the problem is obvious, maybe there are financial issues, but if we limp along, oblivious to the real problems, it’s these things that can threaten to derail our process and stop us running our business effectively. This is why we’ve got to get into the habit of identifying our weaknesses. With this in mind, are there any ways for us to identify what is wrong before everybody else points it out to us? 

Identifying Superficial Weaknesses

If we have an issue with some small aspect that we know is an eyesore, such as the website, but we feel there are more important problems that need fixing right now, we can easily forget to go back to the superficial weaknesses and carry on regardless. But we have to remember that with the superficial weaknesses, this links indelibly into our overall perception. Not just from the public, but from the clients as well. It’s important that you make the most of identifying these weaknesses, because if you were the customer and you saw the website in a poor state would you ever think about going back there? Of course, you wouldn’t! But as a quick solution to this problem, there are so many resources out there that can help. From website redesign businesses to numerous marketing agencies that can give your promotional materials a makeover. The quicker you get these superficial issues fixed, the easier it is for you to focus on the things that really matter. 

Drilling Down Into The Problem

The SWOT analysis works very well at identifying your weaknesses, as well as your strengths, opportunities and threats (see the video at the end for more information). But focusing on the weaknesses here is about identifying what the issue is on the surface and then drilling down into the problems so you can make the fundamental fixes. As the weakness is perceived on one level to be in relation to a process failure or a cultural issue within the business, the sooner you find these problems, the quicker you can make these fixes. But, to get to this point you have to look for honest and earnest feedback. This is where constructive criticism can hurt, but it can result in a better and unified company overall. 

Is It Your Fault?

When we turn the mirror on to our business, we are turning the mirror onto ourselves. Sometimes the problems can be difficult to find because we’re not identifying the real issue behind the whole thing. If we are at fault either due to our working practices, management style, or we are ignoring the key problems, this has to be rectified. Those entrepreneurs that think they do nothing wrong, or those people that are addicted to the feeling of power, they are ultimately going to underwhelm themselves and their business, because they’re not treating their employees right. You could argue this is the first port of call because if we can learn how to identify the components we fail at, we can apply this technique to the rest of the business.