• FAQs

          Search engine optimization (SEO) helps businesses drive visits to their website through organic search traffic. Given that the top organic search results receive a third of the clicks, a decline in ranking could be detrimental for your business. Implementing SEO best practices on your website will help to ensure that your web content is seen by as many potential customers as possible. The more visitors you have, the better your chances are of converting those visits into sales!

          Local search engine optimization (SEO) helps local businesses gain visibility by optimizing their local business listings for local search. A business that leverages local SEO will include its address, phone number, local opening times, and exact location in the form of a local citation. The goal is to rank for local searches which are usually performed by people in a specific geographical region looking for a business near them.

          We typically see results within the first 30 to 60 days, but when it comes to SEO, there are many factors at play. It's important to remember that SEO is a long-term strategy and results may not come as fast at you wish.


        • FAQs

          Digital advertising uses the internet to send advertisements to customers who are online through different websites and social media platforms like Google, Bing, LinkedIn and Facebook.

          The price for Google Ads management depends on the monthly ad spend. For accounts with $1,000 in monthly ad spend, the price is $550/month. Between $1,000 and $5,000 a month in ad spend, the price is $950/month. For $5,000 to $10,000 a month in ad spend, the price is $2,000/month. For more than $10,000 a month in ad spend, the price is $4,500/month.

          The price for Social Media Ads management depends on the monthly ad spend. For accounts with $1,000 in monthly ad spend, the price is $550/month. Between $1,000 and $5,000 a month in ad spend, the price is $950/month. For $5,000 to $10,000 a month in ad spend, the price is $2,000/month. For more than $10,000 a month in ad spend, the price is $4,500/month.


        • FAQs

          This depends on the complexity and size of a redesign and if eCommerce is needed. On average, it takes around 14-18 weeks from the web design intensive stage to launch.

          If your website experiences the following issues: it’s not responsive on all devices, has a slow loading speed, the design appears old and tired, users don’t spend long on the site, sales are stagnant, or your business is going through a rebranding - your website needs a redesign to boost your brand awareness and sales.

          Sometimes there’s no need to rebuild a website. Minor edits, refreshing page content and images, or restructuring page layout for SEO best practices can boost traffic and sales.


        • FAQs

          Semantic search launched in 2013 with the release of Google's Hummingbird update. Since then, Google's search engine has become more complex. The integration of machine learning, with RankBrain, and NLP, with BERT, has enabled the search engine to better understand the context of a query and deliver more personalized and targeted results. Semantic SEO is the process of creating machine-readable content using structured data and linked open data to help search engines better understand your content.

          On-page SEO is the practice of optimizing individual web pages in order to rank higher and earn more relevant traffic in search engines. On-page SEO refers to both the content and HTML source code of a page that can be optimized, as opposed to off-page SEO which refers to links and other external signals. From meta tags to page content, website structure, and HTML, on-page optimization services are focused on making your website more visible to search engines.

          Structured data refers to any organized data that conforms to a certain format, such as information in a relational database. When information is highly structured and predictable, search engines can more easily organize and display it in creative ways. Structured data involves using a piece of code that is laid out in a specific format easily understood by search engines. The search engines read the code and use it to display search results in a more dynamic way.


        • FAQs

          An SEO agency has experts in different areas of search engine optimization that may be out of the realm of your marketing team's abilities. SEO can be very complex and time-consuming. Furthermore, as search engine algorithms change it can be difficult to stay current on the latest ranking factors and strategies for improving online visibility. You will likely see a greater return on investment and better results from using a professional SEO agency than you would from tackling this on your own.

          As a digital marketing agency, SMA Marketing provides products and services in four areas: SEO, Local SEO, Digital Advertising, and Web Design

          We focus on building authentic, long-lasting relationships with our clients. We’re goal oriented and results driven and believe in doing good and making a difference in the world.

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Authentic Marketing Begins With You

Authentic Marketing Begins With You

“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

It’s so easy to get sucked into the latest internet marketing trends hoping that your business will suddenly take off. The internet is full of tips, lists, case studies, and how-to guides and while most of this content is extremely helpful (You can check out our resources here), just following everyone else’s path doesn’t always mean you’ll succeed as well. The key to creating remarkable marketing is learning how to connect with your audience in an authentic way. Then you must deliver a powerful solution that solves their challenges and adds value to their lives.

Earlier this year, as I was in the early stages of transitioning my agency’s focus to inbound marketing, I found myself a little overwhelmed with how I was going to position myself in the market. After all, the internet marketing world is extremely competitive and finding my place among the rest wasn’t going to be easy. Now, I am a big believer in looking at what successful people in your industry have done and learning from their experiences. The key is learning how to apply what you’ve learned from others to your business and use that knowledge to create authentic marketing. The consumer is smart and when they sense something seems disingenuous, they bolt and never come back. One of the guys I reached out to early taught me a very powerful lesson. You have to market yourself first, not your product or service. People have to buy in to you before they’ll buy what you’re selling.

Passion is Powerful

“My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style”. – Maya Angelou

Do you believe in what you’re doing? Like, really believe in it. As marketers and storytellers our job is to share an authentic message that connects to our buyers in a compelling and engaging way. If we don’t believe in what we are selling or marketing, then it’s going to be awfully hard to do it with much authenticity. Once you have defined your audience and have a product worth telling them about, you have to create a message that excites you. You can’t expect your audience to be excited about or engage with a message you hate telling yourself.

Being Relevant, the Right Way

“Our job is to connect to people, to interact with them in a way that leaves them better than we found them, more able to get where they’d like to go.” ~ Seth Godin 

The word relevant is thrown around quite often, but in many ways I think it’s misunderstood. Relevant doesn’t mean trendy nor does it mean appealing to the masses. Being relevant is about connecting your message to your buyer in a way that is familiar with them so that they can embrace it easier. Some businesses and organizations believe that in order to be “relevant” they must have paid ads, or they must tweet X amount of times a day or they water down their story to be for everyone and it ends up being for no one. Before doing anything, the question you should be asking is, does this help connect our story with our buyer? If not, it’s not relevant.

Practical Next Steps

So far much of this post has covered some abstract concepts about marketing. My hope is that you are starting to think a little deeper about your business and how you are sharing your message. While thinking different is good, without action it’s pretty pointless.

1. Define Your Buyer Personas:

Determining who you are trying to market and sell to must be your first step. While it would be nice if our product or service was for everyone, that’s simply not the case. Defining your buyer personas will not only help you craft your product’s marketing message, but also give you important insight on how to market yourself to your buyers.

Download our free Buyer Persona Template

2. Think BIG, Start Small:

Planning and goal setting helps give you direction for the future and a plan of action for the present. But often times I think we get too practical in our goal setting. When setting your goals, think big! Go after something that inspires you. I think the reason many of us lack passion in our work is that we aren’t striving for our best. Here’s a simple way to create big goals that you can actually accomplish.

  • Be Specific about what you really want
  • Make sure that each goal can be measured
  • All goals need to be realistic and attainable
  • Your goals need to be relevant to your business and audience
  • Set timelines to meet various parts of your goal.

Download our free SMART Goal template to help you dream big and start small.

3. Think Inside the Box

Too many people spend too much time “thinking outside the box.”(What does that even mean?) One of the best lessons I learned in art school was to embrace my limitations. I had to realize that I was never going to be as good as Picasso, so I stopped trying to be. When it comes to marketing a business online, burnout is the number one reason people fail. You don’t have to do it all, just do something. Blog as much as you can. Be as active on social media as much as you can. Whatever you do, just be consistent. Consistency goes a long way in building an authentic marketing strategy. Embrace your limitations, do your best with what you have and as you get better and streamline your process, slowly add more.

Our culture is great at pulling us toward conformity. Great businesses and organizations are great at swimming upstream. Don’t lose your greatest strength, yourself! Be yourself and use your uniqueness to make a difference.

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