Facebook Monetization

Facebook is no stranger to all of us but it is not just a social media platform. If you have a Facebook page with some level of following; it doesn’t matter whether you have a website, there are many ways to monetize or make money from it. In short, Facebook monetization is possible.

Truth be told – it is easier to start from a Facebook page with many followers and monetize a website rather than start a website and try to build a Facebook page with great following. 

So what exactly does Facebook monetization mean? It basically means making money from something of value you provide to your target audience. Whether it is selling clothes, online courses or even professional services – if you are making money from it, it is considered a form of Facebook monetization. 

There are various ways you can use Facebook to monetize your products or services; Facebook page, Facebook group or Facebook ads. However, we are going to focus on how you can monetize your Facebook page today.

Facebook Monetization

 

Time and again, we hear of companies suddenly gaining popularity or success on Facebook overnight but what we don’t often see is that a lot of hard work and time went into building a huge following before launching their product or service. 

It is important to note that in order to build a Facebook page, you must be willing to invest time, effort and money too. Facebook monetization has become a pay-to-play network and if you want to make sure that your content goes to your target audience, you must be ready to pay for Facebook advertising before you see the sales coming in.  

Facebook monetization might not be available for everyone as Facebook has laid down some strict criteria due to control against scammers etc. Make sure you read through their guidelines before choosing to monetize your products or services so as not to infringe on any rules. Enough said about the theory and legalities – let’s move on to how you can do Facebook monetization, particularly your Facebook page. Here are 4 awesome ideas to get you started:

Facebook Monetization

1. Sell digital content

If you have an area of expertise aka your niche, there is no reason why you can’t use it to sell digital content to your Facebook followers. With the lack of physical space and convenience, many consumers have turned to buying ebooks. 

Eg. You are good and into preparing healthy food because you love to lead a healthy lifestyle so you can actually sell healthy recipe books. 

Digital products are low cost and are easy to maintain as a result of being an information product. Unlike physical products, you do not need to worry about parcels getting lost or shipment delays etc. 

You have total control over how the products are going to be delivered and you do not need to fret about the products going out of stock. You can even give it away as a freebie to those who join your community as to incentivize them into a subscription-based model where you can continually connect with them and monetize your audience, without any restrictions in reach from Facebook’s algorithms. 

2. Sell online courses 

With evolving consumer behaviour and advancing technology, many people are turning to taking courses online because it doesn’t limit them to a physical location or timing. Furthermore, most courses have lifetime access so it makes online learning even easier as users can go back online for a refresher anytime they want. 

The pandemic has made online learning a boom! Whether it is taking pilates classes or joining a unique niche community, there is enough pie for everyone to take advantage of and earn money via Facebook monetization. 

Keeping this objective in mind, adding an online course or private member community subscription can be a great way to monetize your Facebook following. Furthermore, this creates a recurring revenue stream unlike selling a product where the consumer only buys once. Your target audience basically spends on their membership every month.

Facebook Monetization

3. Sell products 

Dropshipping is a very popular concept with many people becoming e-commerce sellers because you do not need to have a physical store to keep your products or merchandise. 

It is a method where the seller uses third parties to produce, pack and ship the product directly to their customers. Whether you are selling accessories or t-shirts, you would be likely to find a dropshipper that covers the entire supply chain so all you need to do is market the product to your target audience. 

This is also a low cost investment where you only need to pay when products are sold. If branded well, the physical product serves as an additional marketing channel for your Facebook page. As the product buyers and their friends continually see your branding, the product becomes the “face” or billboard for your Facebook page and Facebook monetization occurs as an automatic result. 

4. Sell your service

If you have grown your following to a decent level, why not sell this ability as a service? There are many small and medium sized businesses that would love to build their social media presence but do not have the knowledge or experience to do so. That is where you can come in to help them because you have that knowledge and the following to prove it. 

Usually within the influencer community, you would get to know other influencers too and that is also where pulling ranks or collaborating with your fellow influencers will help too. When combined together, you can create significant influence over specific communities. Whether you are a micro influencer or macro one, there is no doubt a business with a smaller following would need your help. 

In summary, Rome is not built overnight and the same applies to building your Facebook following and Facebook monetization. Launching a product or service without a readily available audience can prove to be very challenging. Competition is stiff nowadays because people have had more options than ever before. The key to success is perseverance and consistency – building a loyal audience who trusts in you and believes in what you offer. All the best to monetization!

 

Related topics –> Social Media Marketing Collaboration – 4 Keys To Success

 

Blog Writing - 3 Important Tips

I am sure many of you are familiar with what a blog is but wait, didn’t we cover that already? Isn’t content writing the same as blog writing? Well, kinda but yet they are subtly different. 

Content writing is much broader and it is basically writing about any topic given by a client to meet their specific business goals and that covers a large range of topics. The content can be used to educate, entertain or tease whichever the objective is. Its main purpose is to give value-added information to readers.

Blog writing or blogging as it is commonly known, is more of a personal diary, journaling regularly about the latest happenings in one’s life. It refers to writing, photography and other media that are self-published online. 

Blog Writing - 3 Important Tips

Blog writing started as an opportunity for individuals to write diary-style entries and to share with the world about their personal interests and experiences. This has since become a new trend that is being incorporated into many company websites.  

Why? Because consumer behaviour is evolving at an unprecedented rate and with advancing technology like Google, social media and e-commerce, it is no wonder blog writing has become a necessary new norm for businesses.  

Consumers are getting more tech-savvy and with the social media wave, they search for information online before making a checklist or an informed decision on shopping, food and even professional services etc.  

“But I am not sure what to write and whether the content is good…” Fret not, you came to the right place! Here are 3 essential tips to get you started on blog writing:

Blog Writing - 3 Important Tips

1. Set up the blog

Nowadays you don’t need to know Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) code to start a blog. There are many free blogging sites which you can use to start blog writing and they even come with themes and templates. Basically it is just a few simple clicks of choosing your preferred blog “look” and tada, you have your very own blog in a jiffy!

It all depends on your objectives – whether they are purely for personal pleasure, for business or maybe, a mixture of both. If you want to retain control and maintain a professional image, do consider investing in a domain name and a hosting service. You can install your preferred content management system on your host if you do not wish to create the whole website from scratch. 

2. Find your niche

It might sound cool to write whatever is trending right now but I would suggest that you sit down for a while and ponder about what are the topics that really interest you. 

What have you always been interested in since you were a child or what do you turn to as your stress outlet when you feel down? What do you feel most passionate about? These will form your niche in blog writing.

Blog Writing - 3 Important Tips

Eg. I have always been interested in reading because I believe that knowledge is a great source of power. When you have the necessary information at your fingertips, you can make better decisions about life in general. 

Meditation is something I practice often and it helps me a lot especially during challenging times. A conscious method I use to bring back my focus and inner calm. Combined with the knowledge and experience accumulated over the years, it helps me harness creative solutions and actions to take for the needed hour. 

3. Promote your blog

Creating a well-designed blog and writing great content is merely the tip of the iceberg. In order to get visitors aka organic traffic to your blog, you would need to spend some time promoting it and the effort needs to be consistent. 

Ideally, you should blog as often as possible because the more you blog, the more organic traffic you will have due to optimized content. Especially for blogging newbies, it is important to build your personal brand through the blog content. 

You can alert your inner circle like family and friends. It is also a way to gather constructive feedback about your blog writing. At the same time, be active on social media and post a link to your blog so readers can take a look. Be a giver of information too by posting relevant links or news that you think they might be interested in. 

So there you have it! In summary, we hope that blogging not only helps you unleash your inner creative geek but also open up new avenues of connections too. With consistency, your passion will show through the blog content and branding is just a matter of time. 

 

Related topics –> Email Marketing – 7 Amazing Tips To Increase Sales

Business Development Process Consultancy - 4 Key Reasons

Business development is a crucial part of any business. According to Oxford’s definition, it is the activity of pursuing strategic opportunities for a particular business or organization; by cultivating partnerships or other commercial relationships, or identifying new markets for its products or services. You may ask “How does consultancy help my business?” 

For many firms, business development is just one of the many hats that a managing principal or business leader wears. In most cases, there is insufficient budget or need to hire a full-time business development manager. 

Business Development Process Consultancy - 4 Key Reasons

This is where the experts come in – business development consultants who can help firms drive revenue. The main merit is that they can be hired on demand as and when needed so you only pay for their services when you need them. This adds to huge savings on in fringe benefits like medical, allowance and retirement benefits etc. 

Sounds like a good deal? Let me break it down further for you so you know how to fully utilise the services of a business development consultant. Here are 4 great reasons why you should hire one to drive business revenue and add value to your business development process:

1. Access to expertise

Business development consultants are well educated, experienced and knowledgeable in business development consultancy expertise. Rather than manoeuvering in the dark about what to do next, you can trust their expertise to shed light on the current situation and come up with a sound business development plan. 

This is what they were trained for so no matter which stage your business is at, they will know what are the appropriate next steps to do, doubling your time for driving business revenue.

Business Development Process Consultancy - 4 Key Reasons

2. Fine tune your business strategy

You need a sound and strategic business development plan to reach the desired goals for your business. Moreover, what worked in the past might not work for your business today because consumer behaviour is evolving at a rapid rate with advancing technology. Hence it is important to get an outside perspective into the business development process because everyone is susceptible to blind spots. 

A good consultant can help you create a plan that combines what worked in the past with current consumer behaviour to maximize the effectiveness of your business development process so that limited resources can be used wisely and in the most productive manner. 

3. Align technology with processes

Although there are more affordable business development software now, the usage is at an all-time high. Many CRM and marketing software companies like HubSpot offer free versions with amazing features. As you scale your business, you can upgrade to paid versions to match your business needs so you can automate most of the business development processes. 

However, you need to have processes first before you can manage them and this is how a business development consultant can help you, making sure that the processes are practical, sound and easily understandable so any newbies in onboarding will have no problems implementing them too. 

Some core processes include:

  • Identify your target consumer and demand channels
  • Create consistent sales processes for each channel
  • Use technology to automate most of your processes and for tracking real time growth

Set up SMART goals and dashboards to evaluate progress and tweak necessary adjustments to reflect market realities.

Business Development Process Consultancy - 4 Key Reasons

4. Help you discover your market focus

One of the most common but yet fundamentally important recommendations is that consultants help you narrow your business development focus aka discovering your market focus. 

Like many new businesses, you chase after any opportunity that comes your way or whatever seems to be trending now; not thinking that your business might not have the domain expertise for that. 

Eg. Your business might be in the law industry but your specialty is in criminal law. Instead of taking all types of cases which are also related to family and civil law, why not just focus on your specialty which is criminal law?  

Market focus is increasingly important as consumers look for specialists instead of generalists because they want to be sure they are paying for the best quality and service. Likewise, you not only need to be an experienced lawyer, you also need to be an expert in the relevant fields to be potentially hired by clients to win family or civil cases. 

In summary, we hope it gives you a better idea and inspiration on fine tuning your business development process. With the help of a business development consultant and well planned execution, you are on the way to seeing amazing business revenue.

 

Related topics –> Company Incorporation In Singapore – 3 Important Steps

Company Incorporation in Singapore - 3 Important Steps

Company incorporation aka setting up a company in Singapore is easy and hassle free. Singapore is consistently ranked as one of the best places in the world for doing business. 

In one of Business Insider’s articles, it was stated that Singapore not only has business-friendly laws and flexible immigration policy, it also dominated the list for its simplicity for business tax filing. Moreover, the government offers tax exemptions to startups and has a number of schemes to help them in their initial entrepreneurship journey. 

The Accounting & Corporate Regulatory Authority (ACRA) acts as the Company Registrar. It supervises the company incorporation process in Singapore. It is as per the Companies Act, Chapter 50. All compliance requirements must be met in order to set up a company successfully in Singapore.

Company Incorporation in Singapore - 3 Important Steps

Local and foreign business owners benefit by employing a registered filing agent to set up a business in Singapore. This rings true for many foreigners wanting to start a business in Singapore as they might be unfamiliar with the laws and regulations. 

Foreigners cannot register for a new company due to non citizenship and must hire a local business registration provider to help with the company incorporation process. They also need to acquire a work visa or pass to be able to work in Singapore. 

Even local entrepreneurs are advised to do the same as they might not be fully familiar with the Singapore company law and compliance requirements.

Company Incorporation in Singapore - 3 Important Steps

With the local business registration provider’s expert knowledge and experience, these professionals will direct you throughout the whole process for Singapore company incorporation, helping to save valuable time and money. The process can be summarized in 3 important steps:

1. Choose your business entity

ACRA allows registration of 3 types of business, mainly Private Limited Company (Pte Ltd), Sole Proprietorship and Limited Liability Partnership (LLP). You need to decide on the type of business structure that works best for you before company incorporation. 

A simple method to decide is by how many professionals your business has. Eg. If you are the only one, a Sole Proprietorship might prove beneficial as you will be able to make all the business decisions. 

If there are 2 or more professionals (up to 20), registering for a Limited Liability Partnership might prove beneficial. However, if there are 1 to 50 individuals who own a part of the capital at limited risk, registering as a Private Limited Company would probably work the best for you.

Nowadays, many new companies register with ACRA as “private limited companies” due to its flexibility in scaling. Furthermore, shareholders are not liable for debts and losses beyond their share capital.

Company Incorporation in Singapore - 3 Important Steps

2. Set up your company

One important step to do before company incorporation is to have your company name approved by ACRA first. It is a simple online process and your company name is subject to the following guidelines:

  • The name cannot be identical to an existing business in Singapore
  • The name must not infringe on any trademarks, free of copyright issue
  • The name cannot be obscene or vulgar
  • The name must not have been reserved by another company

Overall, these following documents are required for submission to ACRA:

  • Company name approved and registered with ACRA
  • A brief description of business activities
  • Details of registered company address in Singapore
  • Particulars of shareholders
  • Particulars of directors
  • Particulars of company secretary
  • Foreign Entrepreneurs must submit a copy of their passport and proof of overseas residential address 
  • Foreign Companies must submit Memorandum & Articles of Associations
  • Singapore Residents must submit a copy of their Singapore identity card

3. Register with ACRA and open a corporate bank account

Once the company incorporation documents have been prepared, you can officially register your company with ACRA. Only in rare cases when the company incorporation needs to be referred to a government agency for further vetting, will the process take a few weeks. 

After company incorporation, you can open a corporate bank account so that you can keep track of how much revenue comes in and how much monies are used to cover company expenditure and overhead costs etc. 

In conclusion, the whole process might seem easy but it can actually take at least 2 weeks to 3 months, depending on business size. When you engage a local business registration provider, it not only helps to save the man hours but also automates the whole process so you get to keep track real time. No information is lost in back and forth emails too. We hope this information has been useful and bon voyage to a smooth entrepreneurship! 

 

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Corporate Tax Services - 5 Great Benefits of Engaging A Professional

Tax services are getting highly popular nowadays. Do you find yourself getting a headache whenever it comes to filing business taxes for the past year? There can be so many requirements and it differs from country to country. 

Sometimes it is better to hire tax service professionals to handle and prepare your business tax returns for you rather than doing it yourself. Trust me, you will save so much time and effort that you will feel the cost of hiring a tax service professional is well spent!

With less stress, increased accuracy and maximum refunds, it is efficiency on a whole new level. Leave business tax filing to the experts and you can use that extra time to close more sales, hence doubling your productivity. Still not convinced? Let me break it down to you on the 5 WHYS of engaging a tax service professional.

Corporate Tax Services - 5 Great Benefits of Engaging A Professional

1. Saves money

You might think that it is a waste of money to engage a tax service professional but in reality, it’s gonna be the exact opposite. Tax service professionals live and breathe their jobs so they are constantly being updated on the latest tax guidelines and regulations. 

Combined with experience and knowledge, they know their stuff well, like the back of their hands. They will be able to identify the possibility of deductions and credits that you might not be aware of so by calculating the value of man hours that would be required for you to complete the business tax filing, you may find that engaging a tax service professional is well worth the money. 

2. Maximizes time

If you actually sit down and calculate the time required to file business tax returns from start to finish; also depending on your business size, it can range anywhere from 20 to 100 man hours per year. So an average business tax return might take 50 man hours. Imagine what you can do with 50 hours?!

During this 50 hours, you could either spend some quality time with your loved ones, go for a short vacation to rejuvenate yourself or close more sales that could at least double your income for the year. Productivity is definitely in motion!

Corporate Tax Services - 5 Great Benefits of Engaging A Professional

3. Reduces errors

When you are inexperienced in business tax filing, errors will happen and they can delay any refunds or rebates due to you. Some common tax errors are simple mathematical errors, entering payments on the wrong line or computation errors when determining taxable income.

With their extensive training, knowledge and experience; tax service professionals will greatly reduce the risk of errors that will be made on your business tax returns and this helps to decrease the likelihood of being subject to an audit.  

4. Assistance with audits

While audits are rare, should your business be audited, you can rest assured that your tax service professional will have your back. Since he/ she was the one who helped you with the business tax filing, you can direct all enquiries to him/ her.

Corporate Tax Services - 5 Great Benefits of Engaging A Professional

Audits can be very stressful and not only that, you need to know and remember where and when a piece of information can be found whenever the auditors ask for clarification. I can’t even remember what I ate for dinner 5 days ago, let alone such financial details! So rather than possibly subjecting yourself to more stress and frustrations, it is best to leave business tax filing to the tax service professionals.

5. Peace of mind

When you engage a tax service professional, you basically just need to give them the required information and they will sort it out for you according to current business tax regulations. 

Tax service professionals will know your tax situation at a glance and will be able to pinpoint quickly what are the next steps; identify deductions and credits to reduce your tax liability etc. Knowing that your business taxes have been filed properly each year gives you peace of mind. No stress, easy peasy! 

In conclusion, we hope you get to spend more productive time on improving your business turnover and leave business tax filing to the experts. All in all, we hope you can achieve more with less!

 

Related topics –> Accounting Services – 4 Powerful Benefits

Accounting Services - 4 Powerful Benefits

More and more companies are engaging accounting services. Why? Many small businesses, entrepreneurs and startups find it challenging to hire an accountant, especially one with the right skills and experience to handle all their bank account operations, financial statements, analysis of financial data and issuance of invoices etc. 

Nowadays, combined with the ongoing pandemic, it proves even more challenging to find a qualified and eligible person at an affordable rate. However, business owners cannot deny that outsourcing their accounting ultimately benefits them at the end of the day. 

Accounting Services - 4 Powerful Benefits

More than one thirds of small businesses are outsourcing their accounting to accounting services firms because they do not feel confident and comfortable doing it on their own due to time and lack of experience etc. Trust me, outsourcing your accounting will do you more good than harm so let us run through on the 4 powerful benefits of outsourcing your business accounting: 

1. Access to expertise

Accounting services firms specialize in accounting so naturally, it is advisable to outsource your accounting to them. Because this is where the accounting experts are and they literally have the information and knowledge at their fingertips. You will also be ensured that compliance is in check. 

By engaging a firm, you can be confident your finances are in good hands. They are handled by the most qualified individuals in an unbiased and objective manner. Accounting services can be customized to meet your business needs at different stages of your business so there is greater flexibility across the board. 

Accounting Services - 4 Powerful Benefits

2. Saves time

As the saying goes, time is money. You definitely save a lot of time when you outsource your accounting. When you have a team of accounting services experts having your back, you can be rest assured the accounting responsibilities will be completed on time. 

You also free up time for yourself and for the inexperienced employee who has had to handle the accounting because a suitable accountant could not be found. Workload management is enhanced and thereby increasing productivity.  

3. Reduces business costs

Studies have shown that an average audit department produces 1,400 hours of productivity per employee each year and absorbs the remaining hours as the price of having the department. With outsourcing, you only pay for the accounting services you need and when you need them.

Firms manage the relationship between the accounting experts and businesses so you do not need to worry about staff costs or turnover. This means that you do not need to allocate time or money to training and recruitment, at the same time not having to worry about accounting tasks being neglected because the employee is sick or on maternity leave. 

Engaging accounting services help you streamline processes and better results are achieved, with insights on business performance so you can plan and use your budget wisely.

Accounting Services - 4 Powerful Benefits

4. Automation

Many businesses use accounting software and cloud servers to save space and time. Not only that, it will help to reduce risks too. When you use cloud servers and accounting software, you can access anytime and all the information is in one central place. 

Automation accounting helps to minimize human errors and accountants get real time reports. They help in detecting potential issues and resolving them in the early stage. Most importantly, it also reduces the probability of internal fraud.

Automation accounting software is affordable and you can scale accordingly based on your business needs. For starters, you can try Xero which comes with a free version and is highly popular for its versatile features such as automatic bank and credit card account feeds, invoicing, standard business and management reporting etc.

There are so many benefits to outsourcing your business accounting. In summary, we hope that business owners can save huge in terms of time and money, allowing the resources to be allocated and used more wisely to reap better business performance.

 

Related topics –> Business Development Collaboration – 4 Important Pillars

Business Development Collaboration

Business Development Collaboration? Never really heard of this term before or there is not much information on this particular topic…It is something that not many firms are putting into use yet but time and technology has proven its ability to be a highly effective method in business development.

When we talk about business development, we are talking specifically more on how internal teams can work with one another to bring the sales revenue in – separating and distinguishing the difference between successful and uber-successful, superstar firms.  

Usually in every firm, the sales team is the one mainly responsible for bringing the business in and hence the most highly valued in the whole firm. But look at it this way – before the business comes in, it could be possible that the new potential prospect called and made an enquiry on your firm’s products and services or the newly clinched sale prospect called and asked about billing of the invoice. In both cases, the customer service and billing departments would be involved. 

Business Development Collaboration

If they should encounter a bad experience at any point of time, it could burn the opportunity of clinching a sale or further sales with the new client. You must be thinking “The business development team knows what we are doing and our marketing is top notch, right?”. What if you could double the closing speed with half the effort? Wouldn’t it make hitting targets so much easier just like taking a walk in the park?

Let’s expound on this further. Imagine an important contract is up for renewal and this renewal could affect your bonus for this year and hence getting your new fancy automobile. The client has gone silent, refusing to reply to your text messages, calls or emails. 

Plus there is so much stiff competition from other information technology (IT) firms, you really have no idea whether the client would continue to choose your firm as their preferred IT services provider. 

As staff members rallied together and discussed the issue, they realized that their head of customer service actually had a personal relationship with the client’s head of IT operations after knowing each other at a business conference. The head of customer service engaged and identified service issues that could have cost the firm millions in lost business. 

Now that you understand how a business development collaboration could improve your business revenue, let’s break it down further into 4 most important pillars to get you started:

Business Development Collaboration

1. Business development is an organizational mission

You have gotta come to terms with this notion that business development is an organizational mission instead of an individual or departmental one. The saying “Teamwork makes the dream work” definitely rings true! 

You need to decide from top down, that your firm will empower strategic partners, employees and business colleagues to drive business growth by using their combined networks of influence. Create systems and processes as well as address personnel or obstacles that stand in the way. 

2. Circles of influence

The circles of influence are not to be overlooked and what are they? They are Networks of Influence (NOI), Community of Influence (COI) and Event Engagement Influence (EEI). 

NOI – popular networking social media like LinkedIn and Twitter offers powerful insight on the relationship between a firm’s employees and its prospects. 

Eg. A mid-sized catering firm penetrated a major fintech company after its head of business development noticed a mid-level employee engaging directly with the prospect’s VP of operations, whom she had met at a business conference. 

COI – face to face interaction remains crucial to business development success. However, advancing technology like the internet eliminates the prospect’s need for such communication in many stages of the sales cycle. 

Thus our reliance on communities such as interest groups or non profit organizations, is key to bringing people closer together than ever before.   

EEI – events are another important driver for face to face connections. Always do up your homework or action plans before an event, during an event and after an event. 

They are foundational to your event strategy, especially what you do after an event because after all, that is the most important stage to gaining a return on your action plan and engagement. Being prepared is half the battle won.

Business Development Collaboration

3. Prospect relationship maps (PRMs)

Leveraging relationship-building activities such as NOI and COI will increase the potential entry points into many prospect organizations. Developing a formal process for PRMs serves as a powerful account-based strategy because they dive into many aspects – prospect companies, their employees, work history and social media profiles etc. This paves for a smoother highway to success.  

4. Strategic Advisory

The benefits of consultative selling are well documented and your prospects can definitely benefit from this. There are many subject matter experts, data and intellectual property at all levels in your firm. 

Developing a strategy and process to deliver this data in layman terms be it using an advisory board or digital marketing, adds value to your prospects on an ongoing basis and will reap its harvest when the closing of a sale is at hand.  

Business development collaboration makes or breaks the company and revenue in the long term. Practising all these deliverables with well planned execution will put you in a more favourable position with prospects, stakeholders and clients. It ensures longevity to continued business success – like a tree, planting its roots in the ground and grows strongly with lush green leaves no matter the season.

 

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Social Media Marketing Collaboration - 4 Keys To Success

You might have seen it somewhere else but let me explain for the benefit of anyone who is unsure of what social media marketing collaboration is. Collaboration or otherwise known as collaborative partnerships, are agreements and actions made by consenting organizations to share resources to accomplish mutual goals. 

In order for collaboration to happen effectively, organizations in a collaborative partnership must share common goals and rely on participation of at least two parties who agree to share resources, including knowledge, people and finances. The essence of collaboration is a win-win situation where all parties involved benefit from mutually working together. 

Social Media Marketing Collaboration - 4 Keys To Success

As the saying goes, teamwork makes the dream work. Collaboration is also about teamwork and if you are fairly new to this, don’t worry.

We gathered 4 practical tips to get you started:

 

1. Find the right brand to collaborate with

The goal is to expand your reach and acquire new potential customers but in order to do that, you need to find and partner with a brand that will not only help you to achieve your goal but most importantly, care about your products or services too. 

It is not just about working with the big boys, no doubt numbers are important but so is quality. Eg. If you own a salad company, you may want to partner with a gym because many people are health conscious nowadays and hence the collaboration between a salad company and gym makes sense because the concept of healthy lifestyle is being advocated. 

This collaboration will expose your business to new people who will by default, be interested in your brand because diet and exercise go hand in hand together to create a healthy lifestyle. 

Something to note is that you should look for brands who are already active on social media because when you do a collaboration, it is about sharing resources and responsibilities together to achieve mutual goals. If they are not active, most probably it is safe to assume that you won’t benefit much from collaborating with them.

Social Media Marketing Collaboration - 4 Keys To Success

2. Set clear goals, expectations and deadlines

It is good to have collaborations but collaborations without measurable metrics equals to having none at all. There must be clear goals, expectations and deadlines. Eg. If your goal is to grow your email list, then you should focus on email marketing so you can use a contest or giveaway to achieve this.

The more people there are working on the social media campaigns or projects, the easier it is for things to slip through the cracks. Accountability is of utmost importance and crystal clear deadlines should be set on deliverables as well as individual roles from both companies. 

Don’t just assume that the other party knows what to do and in order to prevent the collaboration from backfiring, craft a clear concise strategy on roles, responsibilities and deadlines so everyone knows what is expected and will work together to achieve the same goals. 

3. Social media style guide

Once the goals, roles and deadlines are outlined, you can further refine the processes by writing a social media style guide. This will cover the look, feel, voice, tone and language so it will be consistent among team members. 

That means whenever a graphic or document is produced, there must be uniformity in the fonts, colours, logos, formats and product names etc. You could also consider having an adjusted style to showcase the two brands working together. 

This guide must be available to everyone involved in the collaboration so you can spend some time to plan and do the writing up. Once it is completed, you can upload into a common folder where everyone can refer to the guide any time.

Social Media Marketing Collaboration - 4 Keys To Success

4. Work with influencers

We mentioned about giveaways so both parties can consider working with influencers to increase your reach and branding. You can reach out to a relevant influencer and encourage them to run a giveaway post for their audience. It is an effective way to gain new followers and raise brand awareness. We call it the 3-fold effect!

Another common method to increase brand awareness via influencer marketing is asking them to do paid posts. When doing paid posts, consider their audience quality, correspondence of their audience and engagement rates before choosing the right influencer. 

If you offer the influencer more than they demand, chances are they will offer you better discounts and options. Instead of asking them to do one-off partnerships, you can ask them to give you more discounts for another few more posts and due to retargeting options, it will convince people to make a purchase when they see the influencer talking about your products or services more than once.  

There are so many ways to market your business and joining forces will definitely benefit your business tremendously. We hope these tips have put you on the fast track and happy collaborating!

 

Related topics –> Snapchat Marketing – 5 Best Practices For Your Business

 

Snapchat Marketing - 5 Best Practices For Your Business

What is Snapchat, otherwise commonly referred to as Snap? Launched in 2011, it is a mobile app for Android and iOS devices. One core concept of the app is that any media you send will only be made available to the recipient for only a short time before it becomes inaccessible. Why so? Because it is designed to encourage a more natural flow of communication between users. 

When Snapchat started, it was focused on private, person-to-person sharing but now you can use it for a variety of tasks – live video chatting, messaging, sending short videos, creating caricature-like Bitmoji avatars and sharing 24 hour chronological stories that are broadcasted to all your followers and “Discover”; letting brands show ad-supported short-form content.  

Snapchat Marketing - 5 Best Practices For Your Business

It also allows you to store media in a password-protected space which is helpful especially if you feel certain files are private and confidential. That’s not all, there are other features available like the ability to add geo-filters and AR-based lenses to maps. 

According to a survey done in January 2020, 218 million users were active on Snapchat each day and that means millions of Snaps are created, sent and seen every day. It is highly popular among millennials and if your business’s target audience is more of the younger crowd especially those under 35 years old, this is still a good platform to market your branding. 

Some of you might not be familiar as Facebook and Instagram are more commonly used for promoting your business but fret not, we got you covered.

Here are 5 best practices to help you with your branding:

Snapchat Marketing - 5 Best Practices For Your Business

1. Research and execution 

This is a must when planning your marketing strategies. Always do your research first on competitors and what kind of campaigns attract followers as well as conversions. At the same time, it will help you decide what your objectives are and finally, branding that you want to tell people about. Eg. Your business might be selling burgers, but if you are a vegetarian or a firm believer of healthier eating; you can sell plant-based meat burgers especially when people are so health conscious nowadays. 

Once you have identified your business branding objectives, look and feel; create a content calendar so you will know what content to post, when to post and how much time you should spend on follower engagement. And remember – consistency is key when it comes to branding. Make sure your concept, look and feel are consistently the same so your branding presence on Snapchat can be increased.  

2. Let your audience know you are on Snapchat

If Snapchat is a new marketing platform for your business, the first step is to inform your audience you are here. As Snapchat is designed differently from the other social media giants like Facebook and Instagram, you will need to use some new techniques to attract more Snapchat followers.

There are 3 ways to do this:

  • Cross-promote your Snapchat username: If you already have gained a following, you can schedule or share posts on Facebook and Instagram etc to share your Snapchat username.
  • Create a “add me” url: Under the “settings” icon in your Snapchat business account, you can click on “username” and see what is your unique url (snapchat.com/add/yourusername) so you can put it in your posts or marketing materials.
  • Create a snapcode: A snapcode is a badge that people can scan with their mobile phones. Works exactly like a QR code, users can add you easily. It also allows users to find your brand’s unique filters, lenses and content. You can add this to marketing materials or even merchandise.

Snapchat Marketing - 5 Best Practices For Your Business

3. Brand engagement

According to statistics, Snapchatters are 60% more likely to make an impulse purchase. While chatting with friends, users are likely to discover new businesses. With the current design of Snapchat, chats happen on the left side of the screen while brands (Eg. Cosmopolitan magazine, MTV) and content creators can be found under “Discover”, on the right side of the screen. 

Because users spend such a long time chatting every day, they are spending 35% more time in the “Discover” section where constant exposure to brands makes them purchase something. That is what you call the effect of brand awareness on consumer buying behaviour. 

4. Make the most of sponsored AR lenses

Snapchat’s artificial reality (AR) lenses change the way users experience the world. You can superimpose digital effects, animations or graphics on top of a real-life image. Snapchatters can interact with the superimposed image and the AR effects move as your real-life image moves. 

75% of Snapchat users engage with AR every day so it will be a good idea to use it in your branding because it allows users to interact with your branding and increase engagement at the same time. Especially for businesses in the makeup, fashion, cooking, travel and fitness industries; they will definitely do well due to the aesthetics etc. 

5. Advertising and tracking metrics

To make the most out of Snapchat and to test which type of ads works the best for your target audience, you might want to incorporate various ad formats as part of your marketing strategies. There are 4 types of ad formats – Snap ads, Collection ads, Story ads and Dynamic ads. You can increase brand awareness and drive traffic to your website, resulting in potential purchases. 

Similar to Facebook, Snapchat has an analytics tool – Snapchat Insights. You can see who is viewing your content and check which campaigns are doing well; letting you know and understand user preferences as well as tweaking to produce better strategies the next time. 

In conclusion, Snapchat features are not exhaustive to these few but these are some of the best practices for marketing on Snapchat. We hope this helps you to kickstart your new marketing journey!

 

Related topics –> TikTok Marketing – 5 Useful Tips For Business

TikTok Marketing - 5 Useful Tips For Business

TikTok which originated in China, is a Chinese video-sharing social networking service. It is used to make and share a variety of short videos in many genres; dance, comedy, education and makeup tutorials etc. The videos have a duration of 3 to 60 seconds. 

TikTok eventually came out with an international version in 2018 and though low in initial download numbers, it caught up soon worldwide and became 9th in the ranks of social networking sites. As of 2020, it has 689 million active users worldwide.   

The mission statement of TikTok is to capture and present the world’s creativity, knowledge and precious life moments from the mobile phone directly. As such, it empowers and enables everyone to be a content creator; sharing their interests, passion and creativity through their videos. 

TikTok Marketing - 5 Useful Tips For Business

Its user-friendly functions combined with this unique feature of TikTok; it is more of an entertainment platform so it makes content creation and shareability easy. Anyone can be a content creator and due to the time duration of videos, consumption is crazy high; making it a force not to be reckoned with whilst competing against social media giants like Youtube, Facebook and Instagram. 

So what can TikTok do for businesses?  The largest demographic of TikTok users is between the ages of 16 to 24 but is not limited to only Gen Z as there are users from other age groups using TikTok actively. Because it is more of an entertainment and visual platform, it would benefit certain industries greatly like fitness, makeup, skincare, dance, baking and filmmaking etc.

Now let’s look at these 5 tips to get you started:

 

1. Research

This is a mandatory prior work that every business needs to run through before planning, writing and creating the type of content suitable for their target audience. Like social media channels, you need to do some research on trending topics or what your competitors are doing so you know what topics or themes to use for your videos. To be prepared is half the victory – Miguel de Cervantes.

TikTok Marketing - 5 Useful Tips For Business

2. Create fun content

Tiktok’s main attraction is fun and creativity so in order to attract viewers, you need to create fun videos. And because Tiktok encourages people to create and share content with their mobile devices, creating your content is so easy and the least expensive. It also comes across as authentic when you use your mobile phone, making people feel connected to you as you build their trust with your branding. 

If you watch enough Tiktok, you would realise some of the highly popular videos are those with pets or children so if you have a pet or child, you can try creating videos with them as your cast. You will be surprised at how viral these videos are! Nothing complicated, just do a simple theme and weave your branding into the videos – this is what you call the TikTok magic! 

3. Work with TikTok influencers

The number of TikTok-specific influencers might not be many yet, but they will be in time to come and you can work with them to widen your reach on the platform. It also depends on the modus operandi of your business or your target market. 

If your business includes the Chinese market, you can work with Chinese influencers to promote your branding as TikTok originated from there and they have many influencers who can easily help you spike brand awareness and conversion rates. 

TikTok Marketing - 5 Useful Tips For Business

4. Use hashtags

Another way to promote your business is to launch a hashtag challenge. A hashtag challenge is when you encourage TikTok users to create or recreate content and add your branded hashtag to it. 

What do we mean? Eg. The brand, Guess, was one of the first companies to launch a hashtag challenge. They encouraged TikTok users to film themselves wearing Guess’ new denim line with the hashtag, #InMyDenim. That was how the hashtag challenge trend started because it not only promotes your branding, but it also drives user interaction and engagement.  

5. Advertising with TikTok

Similar to Facebook, they offer a few ad formats and they include:

  • Infeed Native Content: This type of ad is similar to Instagram story ads and supports multiple features like website clicks or app downloads. They play between user content; are between 9 to 15 seconds long and include buttons.
  • Brand Takeovers: The brands’ one day of monopolizing TikTok by creating images, videos or GIFs (Graphics Interchange Formats) with embedded links to landing pages or hashtag challenges. Only one ad can show in that slot for the specific category per day.
  • Sponsored Hashtag Challenges: As you know, hashtag challenges are always a traffic-driving strategy so your business can pay to sponsor a hashtag challenge and obtain a custom banner across the Discover page so millions of users can see and join in, viewing the challenges with your branding promoted in the background. 

In conclusion, if your business is targeting a younger audience or if it is more to the beauty, fun or even fitness genres; using TikTok as one of your marketing channels will definitely make sense. It is all about practice and personality is also one X-factor in TikTok success. Combined with fun interactive content and marketing strategies, you are going to ace that TikTok game!

 

Related topics –> Telegram Marketing For Business – 4 Great Features You Should Know About