Is Your Business Inspiring the Market Through Pinterest?

With the holiday season in full spring, many users on Pinterest are looking to the platform more than usual for new recipes and decorations. The site is used to share ideas through “pins”; from recipes and DIY all the way to fashion and inspiring quotes.  It’s where people go to get advice, find products they may like, and to be inspired – it is essentially the word of mouth of the internet. More and more businesses are creating boards not just to get their products out there on the site, but also to have their followers get involved in posting pins through shared boards. One of the famous success stories of businesses on Pinterest is about the magazine Real Simple. With their lifestyle marketing techniques, they have now been able to route the most traffic to their website through Pinterest than any other medium. The thing about Pinterest is that it isn’t necessarily about selling – for businesses it’s about engaging users, leading to brand awareness, loyalty, and the eventual purchase.

Here are a few tips for your business to get noticed on Pinterest

1.       The picture. The photo representing the pin is the first thing users notice. Stick to clean images that represent what you want to share well!

2.      Complete boards. Before promoting pins, make sure the boards for your company have clever names, such as Lowes’ board “Grillin’ and Chillin’”. Also, each board should have at least 5 pins in order to look professional. 

3.   Know your market. Aim to post or share your content through pins that go with the idea of Pinterest. On this site, people are more likely to pin an article about secret tips to decorating than a breaking news story!

Will Your Business Be Profitable on Black Friday?

Close to 230 million shoppers made purchases over the Black Friday weekend in 2012 . That amasses to a shopping power of $59.1 billion. With 2013 Black Friday lurking just around the corner, what are you doing to to capitalize on this Thanksgiving retail phenomenon? 

Here are 6 ways to ensure your small/medium sized business sees profit next weekend 

• Hit Locally- Your prospective clients will be inundated with advertisements in the weeks leading up to Black Friday. Many of these offers will be virtually the same—geotarget your ads to potential customers who live close to your business. 

• Invest in Online Coupons and Advertisements- 41% of 2012 individual spending on Black Friday came from online deals make sure you are reaching this extension of your audience. 

• Mobile-Optimize  Your Site- The way people look up information, shop, and make decisions is turning mobile. Aside from promoting your coupons and ads digitally, make sure someone looking for your business or products from their mobile device can easily navigate your site and make purchases. 

• Use Social Media- Don’t hesitate to promote your Black Friday deals on social media. A great way to rally excitement and increase viewer engagement is by making a count-down clock until the Black Friday promotions launch.  

• Use Data- Look at your records from last year and ask yourself what sold well, what didn’t? What made the highest margins? Plan your advertising and coupons accordingly. 

• Plan Ahead- Take into consideration the extra traffic you will have to your business and plan accordingly. Schedule the appropriate amount of employees to work, plan out how you will run your check out lines, make a customer service strategy, and review the “emergency” plans for various situations with all employees.

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Data from CNN News and The National Retail Federation

How To Cash In On Marketing Gold: Sports Edition

With the World Series having just come to a close here in Boston (Go Sox!) sports fever is at a high in the city. While Boston is known for having particularly spirited fans, it seems to be a trend worldwide that game days are marketing gold – Superbowl anyone? While we touched upon this briefly a few weeks ago, we wanted to share some more examples of how you can take advantage of sports for branding on social media.

Following with the Red Sox shaving superstition, brands including the Red Sox started getting the hashtag #getbeard trending on Twitter. Nike goes so far as to feature it on some of the T-shirt merchandise they’re selling in relation to the team. One week later, and the hashtag is still going strong. Gillette, the razor brand, has also gotten in the action by having players David Ortiz and Shane Victorino come in to their offices to get their beards shaved for the One Fund. This move was well documented on Twitter, as they were the first players to shave following the World Series, getting Gillette a bit of attention through social media. In the weeks working up to the World Series, brands and fellow local teams also wished the Red Sox luck using this particular hashtag. It’s a fun way to show support and get involved with

In general however, some studies have found that users check social media twice as much on the day of a big game. Many will also use social media as a means to get updates on the game if they’re unable to watch. It is easy for companies to show their spirit and get involved with other fans by showing their support for teams! In return, it helps your company brand itself as a fun and engaged business that can connect with customers through sports. Luckily for our Boston area residents, the Bruins, Pats and Celtics are now all in their season, so as a business get some attention by showing your team pride!

                

LocalAxis Launches Free Local Coupon Store!

Happy Monday everyone! We are excited to announce that our new coupon store launched over the weekend. Our coupon store, which can be found through the Boston Finds page or running through any of the Your Town pages on Boston.com offers high quality local coupons from our clients.

Here's what you need to know...

What is it? The coupon store is an online store of coupons from a variety of local businesses.

How do I find it? You can locate the coupon store two ways.

1.) Go to the Boston finds homepage http://finds.boston.com/ (you can get to this URL by clicking on the "find of the day" or Boston Finds logo on the Boston.com homepage). Once on the Boston Finds homepage click "Coupons" from the navigation bar.

2.) You can also locate the coupon store through any of the Your Town sections on boston.com. Once you have selected a town, you will see coupons appear on the right hand side of the page. By clicking on any of the coupons you will be brought to the coupon store.

How do I use it? If you find a coupon that you like in the coupon store hit the "print now" button. This will then give you the option to email the coupon to yourself or print it out. You don't pay anything for printing or emailing the coupon, it's all free! 

Let's Go Red Sox: How To Capitalize On The World Series

Over Here at the LocalAxis office we have caught Red Sox fever! As the Sox progress in the 2013 World Series it seems like everyone around town is cheering for Boston and sporting their favorite Red Sox gear.

While we are thrilled our team is doing so well we can't help but take a marketer's perspective on the World Series and try to capitalize on the Red Sox success. A great way to support the home team and get your audience engaging with your brand is by offering photo contests. Why, you might ask? Because simply  stated people love their teams and people love having their photos featured. By creating a photo contest or just asking people to share their favorite photos supporting the team catches audience attention, makes them feel important when they see themselves featured and keeps their interest. These people are more likely to pay attention to and engage with your brand as well as talk about and share your brand.

LocalAxis asked Red Sox fans to send in their pictures of them showing Red Sox support. Below are a few of the pictures we have received so far. If you would like to be included in our gallery send pictures to [email protected] with a subject line Boston Red Sox.

Bella Loves the Red Sox! From Kayla, South Boston

Wally! From Brittany, Medford

Leo Reppin' the Sox. From Deb, New Hampshire

GO Sox! From The Boston.com Ad Ops Team

Supporting the Red Sox at Spring Training in FL. From Brittany, Medford

Go Sox! From Elaine, Allston

Ellie's First Red Sox Game! From Ed, Scituate

Watching the Sox Win At Fenway! From Jesse, Needham

Supporting the Red Sox From the Boston Globe Office! From Erin, Quincy

Watching the Sox at Baseball Tavern. From Kate, North End

Lizzie's First Red Sox Game!From Ed, Scituate

More Red Sox Support From The Boston Globe! From Molly, South Boston

Watching The Red Sox Win! From Rachael, Jamaica Plain

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Small Business Expo Recap

Our team had so much fun last week at the Small Business Expo in Boston. The Small Business Expo is the largest nation-wide B2B tradeshow, conference and networking event for small businesses. As a marketing agency that specializes in small to mid sized businesses, the convention last week at Hynes Convention Center was the perfect place for Local Axis. We met a ton of great people, made some new business connections, learned about various business topics at the conference and had fun along the way. We also gave a way some awesome prizes!

If you're interested in leveraging your marketing efforts please contact us at [email protected]

A Window Into Your Business: Marketing With Instagram

Instagram is a social media platform based on sharing photos in real-time.  It has been largely accepted for personal use, but only 123 of all Fortune 500 companies have Instagram accounts. This opens up a perfect opportunity for your business to get ahead of the game and tap into Instagram’s photo sharing as a marketing strategy.  We’ve put together three tips to help you succeed.

1.       Be Personal. Instagram provides a window into your business. Show behind the scenes photos of putting an event together, employees on the job, or sneak peeks of a new product. Try to mix it up a bit to keep your content fresh!

2.       Use Hashtags. Much like Twitter, Instagram has the ability to participate in a thread through the use of hashtags. Use different ones that are relate to your business but are trending to get yourself on to popular threads. Better yet, if you have a specific hashtag you use on twitter try to use the same one on Instagram for branding.

3.       Launch a Competition.  Everyone loves being a winner, and setting up photos contests on Instagram is a great way to get engagement while promoting your brand. Companies like Mercedes-Benz and Walgreens have done a great job utilizing Instagram  to get customers reaching out though Instagram to win various promotions.

Check out the Instagram For Business Blog for more ideas! http://business.instagram.com/blog/