Whether you are the owner of your company, a worker bee or anything in between, your success — each and every day — begins and ends with your own outlook on life. When you feel gratitude, you are able to more easily see the positive side of things, to see the glass as half full and to be more aware of what you may need to do to move the needle forward in your professional and personal relationships.

Many gratitude gurus believe in the Law of Attraction as it relates to becoming more successful. If you appreciate what you have, you will attract more things for which you can be grateful.

In a business sense, this concept may seem far too abstract. We have come to know that to grow our businesses we need to sell. Sales create wealth. More green puts you further in the black. Right?

True…in concrete terms. But gratitude allows you to focus on what you already have, which clears the way for growth. And, growth, too, creates success and wealth — especially in business.

Start with yourself. Adopt an attitude of gratitude in your personal and professional lives. Corporate gratitude has a direct link to improving morale (your own and that of your colleagues/employees) which, in turn, impacts productivity.

More effort and work equals more growth and success.

Get Grateful!

1. What do you appreciate in life? Write it down. When you are aware of your own blessings, you carry yourself with the kind of positivity that people gravitate toward. In fact, not only does it help them see the silver lining in life, but it makes them want to help you be better, too.

2. Spread Gratitude. When you tell others how much you appreciate them, their work ethic, their team spirit in the workplace, you give them permission to be more positive. Then, there is a natural pay-it-forward mentality and gratitude finds a home at your company.

3. Make an effort throughout the day to be positive. Notice the good and share your thoughts and observations with others. When you look at something in a new way, especially if it’s a person or situation that would usually cause you grief, you can change your reality. Look at what’s right about the person or circumstance. Change your point of view for the better and others will follow suit.

4. Do more than dream about success, take steps to enact it. If you are doing business today, then you are doing business online. If you are hoping and praying your customers find you, then you are not doing your company or bottom line any favors. Gratitude means talking the talk and walking the walk.

At Harmonia Media, we can help take you from “wanting to grow” to SUCCESS fast with targeted digital marketing strategies. Contact Harmonia Media now to schedule a FREE 15 minute phone consultation.

Let’s face facts. You cannot make others feel gratitude. You can, however, be an example of someone who is positive, appreciates life and wants to share joy. When you do this, especially in the workplace, gratitude becomes contagious. And that’s the space where success shines.

Creating a customer experience strategy that delights clients, keeps them engaged and encourages them to refer others to buy from you is not a one-and-done activity. You need to craft a plan, engage your employees to live and breathe the plan and tweak it constantly to make sure it’s working.

So, how do you get started on the path to creating a CX plan that truly is worth the effort?

Let’s make sure we understand the definition of a “Customer Experience Strategy.”

According to Hubspot, “if customer experience refers to the sum of every interaction a customer has with a business, both pre- and post-sale, the customer experience strategy defines the actionable plans in place to deliver a positive, meaningful experience across those interactions.”

Your CX strategy has to engage your entire workforce from every member of management to the vendors you interact with regularly. This includes people who have facetime with customers and those who don’t. CX mustibe a system-wide effort.

Every action creates a reaction from customers. You want people to be inspired to react positively. And, even when that’s not possible, because not every situation is ideal, you want customers to feel cared for and listened to and that their concerns have been heard and are being addressed. Right away.

To do this, you need to make sure your team understands the goal (delighting customers!) When they partake in helping to create the CX strategy, they will “own” it and ensure it works. This means asking for feedback constantly from your team to find out how you can do better.

There’s a lot that goes into creating a successful plan of action including: 

• Setting a company vision based on delighting customers
• Truly understanding your customer base and how they interact with you
• Having critical knowledge of your marketplace including knowing who your competitors are and what they are doing to attract and retain customers

Finally, and this might be the most important piece of the puzzle, you need to evaluate what your company does well and where you need improvement so you can fix what’s broken and monitor improvements.

How will you know if your customer experience (CX) strategy is working? 

1. You’ll have happy customers who buy again and again.
2. Those customers will leave positive online reviews.
3. They will talk about their positive interactions with your company and products/services to everyone they know (and even some they don’t!)
4. Your employees will feel the positive vibes from happy customer interactions and it will show in their work motivation and productivity.

Harmonia Media Will Help Nurture Your Customers

One of the digital components of CX is putting in place a solid nurturing strategy to ensure you stay top of mind when customers are not currently interacting with you. This is vital because you never know when they could be in a position to recommend you, or when they need to buy again.

Harmonia Media’s expertise in nurturing customers through targeted email marketing campaigns is second to none.

Contact us today for a FREE phone consultation. We will help you drive new business to your website and create a customer experience you’ll be proud to shout about!

There was a time, not too long ago, that we (people doing business in the marketplace, any marketplace) thought that if people were talking about us, it was a good thing. Even bad press is press, we would say.

Not anymore. Bad press or, in the world in digital marketing, haters, bad reviews, naysayers on social media, etc., create a huge problem for any company trying to win new customers and keep existing ones. As sure as good referrals can build your business fast, even one bad review or even simply a not-so-positive comment can wreak havoc with your company faster.

What To Do?

When a negative online comment is posted, and it someday will, because try as you might, you can’t please everyone, you have to recognize it, not ignore it, and manage your reaction appropriately.

In the world of digital marketing strategy, we call it online reputation management. And, if you are doing it well, you have a proactive plan in place to stay on top of all online comments, good and bad.

Size Doesn’t Matter as Or Does It?

Whether your business is a two-man shop or a big corporation, negative tweets, posts and comments will hurt your reputation. They may scare potential customers away. And, if the action that caused the comment is particularly egregious — even if it’s just a perception issue — the damage will be even worse. The size of your business matters in one way, the smaller the company the more damage one ding is likely to hurt.

One thing is certain, you cannot ignore social media. It won’t go away. And neither will the haters.

If you want to grow a business in today’s digital economy, accept that people’s voices, opinions and reviews matter…A LOT.

So, here are some tips to help you get out in front of your reputation and behind your brand if you get attacked. 

• Attract Fans. If you work very hard to get your customers to rely on you, respect you and trust you and your products and services, they will naturally speak kindly of you, refer you and post and tweet great things about you.These fans and their positivity will come in handy when you have to balance any negative comments online.
• Know What You Need to Know.  In other words, you don’t know what you don’t know! Therefore, monitor all of your online platforms including your blog and online review sites such as Google and Yelp, etc.If you do this well, you’ll be able to spot any negativity right away and manage it appropriately so that it doesn’t impact your reputation long term.
• Act Fast and Politely If and When the Need Arises. If someone writes a negative review or makes a negative comment about your company, take the high road and respond quickly. Apologize, and try to make amends.  Do everything possible to immediately take the conversation away from the public eye. Email, DM, phone calls all work.After the dispute is resolved, make sure you post how you resolved it. If you truly made the customer happy, you may get lucky enough and they either will take down their original negative comment or post how happy they are that you made things right.
• Don’t Be Too Proud to Make Changes to Ensure the Problem that Brought on the Negativity Doesn’t Happen Again.You know what they say doing the same thing twice and not learning from your mistake the first time, right? It’s really really a dumb business.Companies are made up of great people and, even the best people, the most competent employees, make mistakes. We are human. So, if you get caught making a mistake, and it causes a bad reputation issue, make it right.

Then, assess your business plan to make sure that it doesn’t happen again. Making the same mistake a third time is more than dumb.

Finally, Don’t Go It Alone. Talk to the reputation management experts at Harmonia Media. We understand how uncomfortable it is to have to deal with little problems after they become monster problems. Let us stay on top of your brand and reputation online so that you can continue to grow your business and keep customers happy.

Contact Harmonia Media for a free phone consultation about all your digital marketing strategy needs

For the purpose of this blog post, let’s assume that you have a GREAT website up and running.

Let’s work together to keep the momentum going and drive new business.

Harmonia Media proposes a four-prong ongoing digital marketing strategy. By combining SEO and general website optimization, geofencing and pay per click (PPC) advertising, public relations and a nurturing eNewsletter campaign, we believe we can achieve success.

SEO & Website Optimization:

When more people are able to find your company online faster, the result is likely increased interest and possibly more business. Of course, you want the right people to find you — the people who need what you sell and can pay you for it.

Organic SEO (Search Engine Optimization) increases the visibility of a website while, at the same time, increases the quality and quantity of website traffic. We call this organic because it’s a result of high-quality back-end work done by experienced website optimization specialists.

Paid SEO, on the other hand, is just that; you pay search engines to make sure your website comes up with an option when certain topics are searched. This is called PPC (pay-per-click.)

PPC:

Just as it sounds, you set a budget and each time someone “clicks” on an ad (several options for ads, by the way,) you pay a fee for that lead. Combined with geofencing, Harmonia Media believes PPC is a great way to drive high-quality traffic fast.

Geofencing:

We choose an area geographically and place a high-tech virtual “fence” around it. When a quality lead (we set the parameters for this metric) enters that fenced-in area, they will receive advertising on their social media feeds, Google searches, and even while reading their favourite news site. Geo-fencing goes on behind the scenes, so to speak, using the same GPS system your phone or car uses to find people, places and things.

In other words, if someone is interested in finding a data privacy attorney in a certain geographic location, they would come “face to face” with an ad from you. Once they click on the ad to learn more, they would go to a page on your website that compels them to contact you.

We know that kind of technology, combined with old school public relations, will raise awareness about your company in your marketplace and drive interest (calls).

Public Relations

Harmonia Media PR is led by a national publicist who has generated needle-moving media coverage for countless entrepreneurs, businesses, nonprofits and public policy initiatives.

We can get the kind of coverage for you that will really put your company on the map.

Additionally, of course, another main strategy will be to further solidify your presence in the marketplace as a thought leader.

Nurturing Campaign

Content is King. We know this. When you capture the attention of your prospect and compel them with information, you’ve got them where you want them. A great monthly eNewsletter with multiple sections will inform about industry information, resources, and also promote your services.

Conclusion:

Digital marketing strategy is not linear, nor is it one and done. It takes a variety of shots on goal, over time, to drive success. Harmonia Media believes this quad-play is the most effective and efficient way to exceed your expectations and take your company to the next level.

Did you know that Google is now showing competitor ads in the business profiles of local companies? It’s true and, rather unbelievably, there is nothing you can do about it. You cannot pay to remove those competitors’ ads.

Say What?

According to Google, “with a Google My Business account, you get more than a business listing. Your free Business Profile lets you easily connect with customers across Google Search and Maps.” That’s awesome. But when a competitor’s ad shows up on your Google My Business account page, is that helping or hurting you?

Hard to say. For now, as I said, you can’t pay to remove those ads — if your listing gets hit with one. But, it stands to reason that ever-monetizing Google execs are thinking about ways to charge business owners to get those ads removed. (No real word from Google on this….we think it’s a good horse to bet on, though.)

They give you a free perk — Google My Business. And, then, they make you pay to make it really valuable. Some gift.

But Why?

Last spring, Google sent out a survey to business owners and some marketing agencies asking about what features they may want to see added to Google My Business. According to industry insiders, one request was to “get leads from competitor profiles.”

Google responded by mixing and matching competitors’ ads and listings. Apparently, Google isn’t so concerned about the confusion this may cause (and is already causing). Talk about bounce rate? Now we have to worry about potential leads going elsewhere before all that “high-quality web content” demanded by Google grabs their attention?

Point of note: Google has every right to do this because businesses don’t actually OWN their Google My Business profile page. Google owns them. Google is a business that has never made a secret of trying to make money. This is the way business works.

It’s a shame we now have to figure out how to rise above and continue to drive traffic and legitimate leads. On the positive side, Harmonia Media has the skills and experience to help your company get where it needs to go with targeted SEO, great content and we even have a few tricks up our sleeve that really drives online customer action.

Contact us Harmonia Media today for a free digital marketing consultation.