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Why email marketing is a must-have tool for your business

In today’s society, email marketing is a common tool to use – but not everyone uses this form of engagement.

This engaging tool has been around for a long time and with the adapting likes of social media marketing, video content and other forms of customer engagement, email marketing is still a highly effective pursuit in a company’s marketing strategy.

But how is this possible you may ask?

Think about it, how many people do you know that has an email account. Everyone, right?

You need an email address to sign up for social media accounts, newsletters, favourite online stores for that matter. Pretty much everything on the internet.

As email has such a constant usage in this technology era so this is where email marketing can really take a stand – especially with your business.

We decided to create a blog around this much-talked-about topic to give you the core reasons as to why you need email marketing within your marketing strategy and how you can utilise this tool for your businesses progression.

Making connections last

Keeping constant contact with your current customers and potential customers are vital for updating them with what’s new in your business. You can inform them of your latest and upcoming products to exclusive discounts and promotions and upcoming events.

Within your email marketing list, you will have already worked with/ sold your products to customers so these engaged clients will already have a core interest in hearing from you.

Mobile is on the rise

Nowadays with the technology that we have at our disposal, mobile is king and due to users opening their emails more on mobile devices than that of desktop, a structured and engaging email marketing campaign is key to success.

An attractive, email model will produce and convert on mobile devices to a high standard.

The personal and engaging touch

It would probably surprise you to know that we have had email longer than you think. With 40 years under our belts with this system, it has intertwined into our everyday lives. Users respond to emails due to actions such as checking emails on a daily basis fabricated into our usual routines. This can provide a large opportunity for businesses to explore options such as new customers and subscribers.

Email is easy peasy

Email marketing is a well-known tool and one of the easiest platforms to work with in terms of online marketing. This iconic and valuable asset obtains enriching real-time data such as CTR, conversion rates, customers who have subscribed and unsubscribed etc.

With this data, it is easy to analyse the performance and results of your email marketing ventures easily.

When you acquire a clearer focus on what you are working on and what you wish to achieve, what needs to be changed and what your core focuses should be, you start to see and understand where your marketing efforts achieve when it comes to your campaigns.

Targeted campaigns produce results

Email marketing is a fantastic resource if you need to reach various users, in regards to analysing the form of relationship you have with them currently.

Example: You may have subscribers that have purchased a product from you in the past. With this information, you would produce a specific type of message to that user as they know your brand and products and may be interested in pursuing a repeat purchase.

Another example: On the opposite side of the spectrum, you will have subscribers that have never bought a product from your business. This is a golden opportunity to introduce yourself and your products to users who are considering to buy.

Email allows you to create “buyer personas” which is where you will be able to place your subscribers in separate lists and maximise your marketing advantages. Targeting your audiences with specific campaigns will allow you to address certain buying behaviours and create a more engaging relationship with your subscribers.

There are many reasons as to why you should definitely place email marketing within your businesses marketing strategy!

We hope you found this blog insightful, if you have any queries, particularly if you want to implement email marketing into your strategy, contact us today!

What are your thoughts?

Tips for enhancing wellbeing in the workplace

In recent years, especially within the creative industry, we have experienced a surge of positivity towards wellbeing within the workplace.

Understanding the benefits of wellbeing in the workplace, how to execute them and how to give your employees a positive experience could be the missing piece of your in-house productivity cycle.

Can it be affordable? Absolutely.

Why should I invest in my employee’s wellbeing?

If you are worried about wellness being expensive then fear not as the minimalist investments can create the most effective results for you and your team.

The results speak for themselves. At Unity, we make sure that our health and well being is top notch and applied to everyone within our team.

With monthly yoga sessions, complimentary fruit, an internal mental health support system and 50% off gym membership we invest in our team to create the most positive and productive support system possible.

There are many benefits to implement wellbeing in your working environment and we thought we would inform you of what they are and also mention what we have in place here at Unity.

Reasons why you should place workplace initiatives into your company

Productivity and Motivation

It is no surprise that when you implement wellbeing initiatives into your company, your team will show higher levels of performance with their tasks due to an increase in their energy levels. With this benefit, you will be able to see a more efficient and focused team.

Your team will become a unit

When your team takes part in wellbeing activities together, whether that is inside or outside of your working environment – they will express a common purpose which will build comradeship and sustainability.

A significant decrease in stress levels

When you partner core fitness, healthy eating, mental health support, and wellbeing activities you will see a significantly reduced level of stress within the workplace.

In addition to this, implementing a mindfulness routine with your team will also decrease the levels of stress but will also increase levels of productivity and creativity.

Here at Unity HQ, we make sure that communication is key within our team and produce monthly ideas to boost our morale and personal health.

Our wellbeing incentives are highly valuable to our team and we support each other through areas such as:

Monthly yoga sessions
Receive a 50% off gym membership
Monthly team outings
Monthly personal goals

We believe health is important and with these forms of connectivity in our team and relaxation properties, we have seen a huge increase within our productivity, efficiency and overall morale.

How to encourage workplace wellness goals in-house

A plan of action is key to encourage your employees to get involved with creating a positive and productive environment – after all, if you don’t ask what your employees need then you don’t know and can’t implement a routine.

A fantastic way to begin your wellness strategy in-house is to simply communicate with your team and come up with suggestions.

Create a productive environment

Your employees will work more productive if their environment envisions and enhances a positive atmosphere, with a limited amount of distractions.

You can prevent aspects such as fatigue and minor headaches by making sure that your environment has a good quality of lighting and have positive and inspiring decor around them, such as motivational quotes. By implementing these simple aspects, you will increase brain functionality, morale and stress levels. Great, right? We agree!

Ideas for workplace wellness initiatives

The choice is endless!

You could send your employees weekly or monthly educational health emails that involve wellbeing mini exercises, team exercises and positive words of healthy eating or presenting your team with an external presence such as a yoga teacher or health advisor and go through exercises and individual appointments to talk about their health goals.

At Unity, we had the pleasure of inviting Josh Plant, Professional MMA fighter into our office where we received a 1 to 1 meeting with Josh to discuss our habits, goals and what we would like to achieve within our health and wellbeing plans.

We took away a vast amount of information and evaluated our current health issues and established solutions for a healthier future.

By having a holistic approach with your wellbeing incentives, you will be able to show your staff that wellbeing is not just about the body but also the mind and how those two entities combine as one within your working environment. By applying this approach, you will be able to visualise an increase in productivity and boosted morale with your team.

Work Productivity

As you can clearly see, wellbeing programs and initiatives make an impact on your team development and productivity levels within your business. But what can you offer as an employer to influence these changes and embed these incentives into your employees everyday routine?

Encourage creativity with collaboration spaces – People need their space, but they also need that connection with their fellow colleagues. By arranging desks into connected units, your employees will be able to gather easily from their desks to compile ideas and discuss overall business quickly and efficiently. By connecting these tables, you will also be able to make a sufficient amount of space around work units, providing a more spacious environment for your employees.

Flexible work hours – All of your employees are different and have their own personalities and private lives, all with different external commitments too. This could be areas such as family commitments and health requirements so by implementing a flexible working hours system, you will be able to produce a boost in employee loyalty and satisfaction – keeping your staff turnover low.

This incentive will also assist with events such as burnouts and will allow your employees to have a higher level of productivity and morale due to the support you are providing for them. You will also see a difference in their attitude to work and their fellow colleagues.

Subsidise development courses – This is a fantastic form of wellbeing as you will be able to demonstrate your commitment to your employee’s training and growth within the company. By proceeding with training and development programs you will be able to improve your employee’s skillset and will be able to provide your team with a sense of personal achievement – which means a boost of morale throughout your team and high levels of productivity for your company.

Here at Unity, we believe in communication and take advantage of this commodity every day. By proceeding with development and training plans, 1 to 1 meetings with our director, monthly wellbeing activities and mental health support – we have seen a significant improvement with our productivity levels and overall morale within our working environment.

The first step is to talk to your team, go around the room and see what exciting ideas you can come up with as a team to secure a more positive and supportive environment for you and your colleagues.

What are your thoughts?

Digital marketing trends to keep your eye on in 2019

December is here, the Christmas music is on in the shops and the money is draining from our banks for Christmas presents.

The New Year is literally around the corner and with the ever-changing world of technology, it pays to stay ahead of the game.

We have some thoughts of our own about what digital marketing trends you will see in 2019.

Read on.

AI chatbots are coming to town

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has seen significant growth in popularity and is one of the greatest technologies we have seen.

With this major piece of tech, it is transforming the way we connect with brands and also how we purchase them. While we have seen AI systems use pre-programmed responses to answer our questions, AI has improved and excelled in a significant way where businesses can go even further and implement complex requests, have personalised responses for their users and have an upgraded overall experience.

It is an interesting concept to consider that at least 80% of customer interactions may well possibly be dealt with chatbots.

Think about it.

With this concept in mind, it would result in 24/7 communication with customers as well as a swift shopping experience.

When considering the number of queries that are expressed through a B2B buying experience, chatbots can be extremely useful within this area, providing a fast approach with their responses and a good resource to engage with customers with personalised messages and tone of voice.

Chatbots are a system that you should embrace, not fear.

Think of them, especially at this time of the year, as your little helpers. A team of support for your business growth and development.

Voice search is here – and it’s here to stay

It comes as no surprise that 1 in 5 Google searches are now being communicated by voice queries. This behaviour is on the rise, with the expectation of rising a further 50% by the end of 2020.

This tremendous growth is being seen in homes as well as businesses with Siri and Alexa now being part of everyday life. Customers are making shopping lists to ordering items and also listening to podcasts and music through their systems.

Voice Search is integrated into our faculties of life, with stats that would be hard to ignore, especially for businesses.

Tip: As a business, you should think more active in terms of voice search, planning around these new developments and behaviours into your marketing strategies. If you aren’t using voice search – you should implement a plan of action for the new year in order to ‘keep with the times’.

Live Video is live engagement

Live videos aren’t for everyone and can seem rather uncomfortable if you aren’t used to being in front of a camera. Live video isn’t just for influencers and fitness junkies, so if you haven’t already participated on a small training course, skimmed through some YouTube information videos or read up on the subject – why not make this your New Years resolution?

New opportunities have blossomed for thousands of companies who engage with their users and potential customers, due to the on-growing popularity through various social media platforms, we see videos everywhere.

New and exciting videos are in high demand to allow businesses to be able to differentiate their competitions. Which is why the power of live video is key to have within your marketing plan.

With live video, you have access to your potential customers expressing their thoughts and opinions in an instant and connected way. With that raw and authentic connection, it is fascinating the number of users that will connect with you after just one live video.

The opportunities for live video are endless, such as live captures of events you are promoting to live competitions, interviews and ‘behind the scenes’ live videos of a product you may be developing or a simple, insightful way to express more of a humane side to your company.

Just like AI, stats are extremely hard to ignore, users are more inclined to watch a live video 2x longer than a live video that has past the live time and is now a standard video on social media.

Food for thought.

User-generated content = free content!

UGC has been around for quite a while, but in recent years it has been shining brightly as its potential has been realised.

User-generated content is the unpaid content that has been created and shared by users that are fans of the brand. Available to all, typically through the use of social media, there are many directions you can take UGC.

The most common source of UGC is in the forms of blogs, customer reviews, GIFs, photos of experiences with that brand and much more.

By incorporating and embracing free marketing from your users through UGC, your brand will be seen in an engaging way. Brand engagement has a continuous rise every time when you add consumer expression to corporate marketing.

Are you really surprised? It is a powerful form of expression, with your users telling the world how they feel and how they love your company.

One of the most important factors you must remember is trust. By hearing other customers expressing their feelings about your company and services provided – it is a powerful source and you will see a difference in your profits.

For B2B companies, User-generated content means a vast amount of resourceful and influential content in a short amount of time.

With B2B buyers valuing that personal connection within their social media platforms and also becoming more dependent with the research that social media brings, it is a fantastic way to build trust for companies when fellow buyers have created content.

AR vs VR in marketing

We saw IKEA take AR to a whole new level with their app back in 2017 where they gave their users the power to actually visualise what a piece of furniture could look like within their home.

Here at Unity, we predict that the use of AR will excel and surpass the use of VR in business, but the use of both of these systems will be popular in the future.

In terms of VR however, developers are devoted to the technology it possesses and will give businesses and consumers many benefits for engagement and experience.

In recent events, AR has begun to develop on its own terms, by bringing in virtual elements and combining them with the real world, this will give consumers a virtual and engaging experience that would give your business the ultimate advantage of your competitors.

For these reasons, we believe that within a few years, surpassing 2019 and more 2024-25, AR will have a solid platform and a more accepted place within our businesses than VR.

In an ever-growing technological world, there is and will continue to be pressure for companies to ‘stay ahead of the game’ in terms of engaging content and systems to surpass consumers expectations and competitors plan of actions.

As we approach the end of the year, we hope that this blog has given you some enlightenment and inspiration for your companies approach to your 2019 marketing strategy.

What are your thoughts?

If you found this blog interesting, get in touch today!

8 Top Tips for the Ultimate Facebook Marketing Experience

Know your audience

Learn how to talk to your audience by knowing exactly who your audience is.

Your Facebook marketing will be far more effective if you know what your demographics interests are and also their needs.

Facebook is a contender when it comes to your target audience. How? Because the platform generates the resources you need, such as Facebook Ad Manager.

Ads Manager allows you to produce a custom audience, allowing you to segment such as genre, location, interests and more.

Talk to your audience, not at them

Your core purposes for social media is to build a relationship with your audience and promote your brand.

Our tip? Encourage engagement with your target audience – allow them to be part of your brand!

The simplest way to achieve this is to ask interesting and enticing questions. Don’t assume that users will comment just because they like your content – ask them to do so.

Other great ways to boost engagement include:

Contests
Polls and quizzes
“Caption this image” posts
“Fill in the blank” posts

Know when to post

Yes, there are certain times in the day where traffic is at its peak.

Post your content when everyone’s asleep, working, or not online, and you’re not going to achieve your targets.

9am
12pm
3pm
6pm

If you utilise these timeframes effectively, you can’t go wrong.

Great content is the best way forward

So, you have a targeted audience, you know their interests, so the next part is to produce some engaging and eye-catching content.

You want followers to come back to your page and find exciting new posts in their feed, and share them as often as possible.

To do this, you have two options:

Consistently write excellent content – and lots of it!
Find content by others that’ll interest your audience

Content that is a mixture of your own produced content as well as finding related articles from reliable sources can provide a great content portfolio for your Facebook page – it allows your audience to visualise that you are not just producing optimised content, but you understand your industry and update your audience with the latest news.

Join the right groups

Facebook groups can be a powerful tool in your marketing process.

To begin, track down a few interesting Facebook groups within your chosen industry. A tip here is to look for responsive groups that ideally have a valuable amount of followers.

To narrow your search a little, try groups limited to your area, or groups that focus on a very specific area of interest.

Consider creating your own group for customers.

This gives your audience easy access to a page to share tips and tricks and with this in mind, would be easier than producing a forum on your website. Naturally, it is also a fantastic way to build brand loyalty with your users and create core content that will engage with your consumers on a personal level.

Video is the future

You might already have noticed how much of your personal Facebook feed is taken up by videos. People enjoy seeing videos in their feed as they scroll, you yourself might be a fan of the same process!

With video, there are some key benefits such as:

They take up a fair amount of space on your facebook page and news feed, making them eye-catching and more likely to be clicked on.
Sharing is caring. Videos have produced a large increase in sharing because of how easy it is to just click share and inform their friends!
Facebook is heavily invested with their video options due to battling with Google (Who own YouTube) so you will have plenty of support from Facebook.
Tip: Don’t forget the subtitles. 85% of all Facebook videos are viewed with the sound turned off. Videos without subtitles have a massive disadvantage and will lose out on engagement.

The age of the Influencer

Influencers are industry Kings and Queens with established and segmented audiences that listen to them, trust their brand and purpose and have users that listen to them intently. If you can find influencers to share your posts or talk about your brand, your message will be engaged with a higher rate of users.

But how can you find good influencers to work with you ask? Again, social listening (the process of monitoring social media channels for mentions of your brand) will help with this.

By tracking industry keywords on Facebook, you’ll find voices with strong voices who use them often. By proceeding with this process, you will find out what specific influencers discuss in terms of your industry, how many followers they have and how many of those followers engage with their content, and much more.

Invest in Facebook ads

Advertising on Facebook is now a key digital marketing strategy in today’s society.

Facebook has more than a billion users every single day!

The main reason however for you and your Facebook Marketing strategy is to analyse user behaviour and the core analytics that Facebook collects and generates for you.

What are your thoughts?

If you found this blog interesting, get in touch today!

Pete Frost announced as Iod Director of the Year Awards Finalist

As many of you are aware, Managing Director Pete Frost won the regional IoD award for Non-Executive Director of the Year for Norton Housing and Support earlier this year, and much to his surprise, he has now been selected as a finalist for the National IoD Awards!

The IoD awards is a great recognition accolade to celebrate the ‘best of the best’ in British businesses, promoting individuals and who have shown continuous leadership talent, success and achievement throughout their career and businesses.

Through his experience managing a digital agency, Pete is integral to the development of Norton House and Support, providing vital commercial strategic insight for a charity that is very close to home.

In celebration of his recent nomination, we caught up with Pete over a cuppa to find out more!

Unity: We know you’ve been working closely with Norton House, but can you share some background info into the charity?

Pete: Over the last 30 years, Norton House has been providing a high standard of accommodation and support to people who are experiencing mental health needs issues and/or learning disabilities, to help them achieve their potential and live their life as independently as possible.

Unity: The work they do sounds amazing… So what are your reasons behind supporting Norton House?

Pete: My father was one of the founding members of the charity, which was established to fill the need for locally based independent supported living, helping people with mental health support needs. I was always acutely aware, growing up of the amazing work that the charity does and the huge demand for its services. I was asked to become involved to help introduce a clearer commercial strategy to the charity that offered a more diverse and varied approach to its services.

Unity: Great, but what does Unity bring to Norton House?

Pete: Having the support of one of Leicestershire’s leading Digital Marketing Agencies allows us to be proactive in a digital age, communicate with our service users more efficiently and make sure that the service that we provide is leading the way in mental health support.

Unity: Thanks for sharing your thoughts with us, and best of luck for the awards!

—-

The finalists were chosen from hundreds of directors that entered the 20 different categories, and an expert judging panel will now decide the National winners that will be announced on Thursday 18^th October 2018 at the Royal Horticultural Halls.

Digital marketing trends that will dominate 2018

Artificial Intelligence

Artificial intelligence has advanced significantly in the past few years through the launch of self-driving cars, flying drones and the most popular, Siri.

But today businesses are keen to leverage AI technology for another purpose completely – Customer services.

Integrating Artificial intelligence with customer service can be a game-changing plan for many businesses. A chatbot service or a ‘customer service agent’ will be available at all times, to intelligently resolve customer requests quickly and consistently, so that businesses can focus on other higher value-added tasks.

Plus, as we see an upsurge in use of digital marketing platforms, it would be a sin not to leverage social media channels with AI. A study by Gartner reveals that an estimated 90% of businesses will use social media for customer service by 2020.

And with 2020 just around the corner, AI is a great opportunity for businesses to implement the technology to allow customers to be transferred across various social media channels. The agents would have access to all the latest information and conversations without the need for customers to start over, thus promising a seamless transition process and a convenient experience for the consumer.

But why stop there…

With smart home applications paving their way for futuristic homes, businesses are developing AI chat agents that will enable the option to communicate directly with smart home devices. This ultimately opens up a whole new level of customer service experience, allowing business to be more accessible through various channels.

Of course, we do have a long way to go before Artificial intelligent devices will outperform humans in many activities, but as businesses are transitioning into the AI focused ecosystem, it is inevitable that self-service technologies and advanced bots will form the backbone of customer care.

AI is no longer the way of the future… It’s the way of today!

Brighton SEO from a Non-SEO person

Last week, an army of individuals wearing checked shirts and big-rimmed specs (stereotype I know) travelled to Brighton for the second Brighton SEO conference this year.

Having never been to this conference, I was sent along with our very own SEO experts to attend, network and of course, expand my own understanding on SEO best practice.

Having experienced first-hand what this conference is all about; I thought I’d jump on the bandwagon and write up my thoughts.

Disclaimer, there are absolutely no key takeaways here that will add any value to your SEO knowledge.

The amazing location

First and foremost, I love Brighton. So any excuse to visit my favourite place is lapped up. Brighton, with its laid back vibe and alternative attitude feels like the right place to be if you want to be amongst likeminded people, all soaking up the atmosphere in a quirky digital bubble.

With so much to offer, the conference was located on the beachfront with amazing offers to go visit local bars and restaurants. The whole ‘work hard, play hard’ motto was strongly reinforced throughout the conference with many of the exhibitors providing tools and vouchers to either enjoy Brighton or recover from Brighton. My fave – the White Digital goody bag that provided sunglasses and a can of Lucozade. Says it all eh?

Networking opportunities

With 1000’s of industry experts in one place, it is easy to meet others and network. The event attracts diehard SEO techs through to marketing automation experts and digital PR strategists. Hey, it attracted me and I like to classify myself as a ‘generalist’ i.e. digital marketer.

From the pub on Thursday night, through to Smokeys BBQ for lunch, we were surrounded by Brighton SEO’ers.

It was great to meet new people and build strong connections in the industry. Who knows when you may need that one contact right?

The lectures

Brighton SEO is structured in such a way that it helps attendees navigate the day based on their preferred topics.

I chose to attend IDM Academy in the morning session, with the focus on data collection and legal implications to brands and businesses alike. Not only was the session delivered in an engaging and thought provoking way but I genuinely walked away thinking about the various clients I manage and how we need to start considering data collection legalities post Brexit!

I also attended the content session – which, unsurprisingly was at full capacity. Covering topics such as email marketing and content frameworks, there were some gems that I came across – check out my live tweeting from the day by following me on @sarrahahmed01 for some incredibly insightful tweets.

My fave snippets:

1) Data collection post Brexit is tightening up- check your opt in and privacy policies!

2) Content isn’t king. UGC is. Hallelujah!

3) For every £1 spent, email marketing generates £20 on revenue

4) 31% of customers are likely to spend 31% more on a business with excellent reviews (gasp)

5) Pick your platform first and then create the video. One size really doesn’t fit all

Cue shameless plug to follow me on Twitter if you want more snippets ….

So is it worth it?

Without a doubt, it’s the place to be and to be seen if you are an inspiring, mid-weight or established SEO expert. Whilst I am sympathetic to SEO and the importance of it, I am by no means an expert.

As a Digital Marketer, there is value in attending the conference. You’ll be exposed to new content methods but most importantly; you’ll be amongst some of the greatest SEO experts in the UK.