Tips for a successful email marketing campaign

Email marketing is becoming more and more popular as the price of direct mail continues to climb. With the proper planning a email marketing blast can motivate your customers to make a purchase or persuade new customers to use your product or services.

1. Get a plan Stan- Behind every great email marketing campaign is a plan. A plan gets you where you want to go, sets objectives for your campaign andmaps out ways to meet the objectives. Much like a map, with out a good plan you will have know way to know how to get were you want to go.

2. Target your market- Before you can blast out your emailer you need to define your target market. The more targeted the email the better your results. Once you determine who you are going to reach, you can then tailor your email marketing message to that customers needs. Always remember the more specific the email peices is to your target markets needs the better the results of your blast will be. Breaking your email mailing list into market segments and then tayloring the message for them is much more effective then blasting your entire list a general message.

3. Make it good looking - Your email marketing peice should be atractive and easy to read in all the different mail clients.

4. Give a call to action.

5. Follow Up

Need help creating your email marketing campaign?  Give us a call today- 608-758-4841

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Credit Card Processing- How Does It Work Online?

One of the questions we often receive from clients is how online shopping carts handle credit card processing.  The main E-Commerce platform that we use can be setup two ways when it comes to processing credit card payments.

1. Authorization only: This state means that the credit card of the customer has been verified, but payment has not been processed yet. The capture button must be clicked in order for payment to be collected.  Until you click the Capture button in the admin section, the payment will remain as Pending and no funds will be transferred to your merchant account.  This method is usually only used when manually processing orders or if you have problems with cancellations.
   
2. Authorize and Capture: If you are using a payment gateway, such as Authorize.net or PayPal Website Payments Pro, this setting will authorize the card number and automatically transfer the funds into your payment gateway/merchant account.  Once an order is placed and the funds are transferred into your account, you will need to void or force a refund in order to cancel the order and transfer money back to the customers card.  This will usually take a few days to process.

Foremost Media can help your company with all your eCommerece website development needs.  Learn more about our services here.

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Common SEO Questions and Answers

Here is a common questions we receive from new clients regarding SEO and launching their websites: 

QUESTION: In your experience, how long does it take before a new site starts showing up in Google and the other search engines? I realize it probably varies, but I’m just curious about what kind of average to expect.

ANSWER:  Regarding your question, there are a couple answers.  Search engines work by sending out small programs called "spiderbots" to "take pictures" of websites.  In order to take a picture of a site, they need to be able to find it.  This is called being "indexed".  In order for this to happen, it is important that your site be submitted to the search engines.  This is relatively easy to do.  The search engines may also "find" your site if another "indexed" site has a link from their site to your site.  Now, once a site is "indexed" it becomes POSSIBLE for you to rank for keywords in the search engines.  However, it does not guarantee that you will.  To get "indexed" can take anywhere from a week to a couple of months.  

Whether you rank for keywords in the search engines is a different story. It is entirely dependent on a number of SEO factors and is not possible to give you a time frame for these because of the complexity of the factors as well as the volatility of the web as a whole . It's very important to start working on your Search Engine Optimization while your site is being built. There are many on-site factors that should be addressed as the site is built to give your site a leg up on the competition. After site launch you should include some on-going SEO services to keep your site moving in the right direction.

QUESTION: My understanding is that Google puts new sites into a sandbox for a certain amount of time to ensure the site is stable before even listing it among search results. If that’s the case, how long do you usually see a site in the sandbox? 

ANSWER: The "sandbox" is a theoretical SEO concept. The sandbox concept suggests that domain name age determines Google's trust of the domain name. It suggests that a lack of trust during the (first 3 months usually) when a domain is new causes an automatic suspension (or holding pattern) of rankings. In my experience, the "sandbox" is partial myth. I say partial because indeed the age of the domain is an SEO factor. Also, Google keeps an eye on how fast SEO factors are "throttled" and if you go too fast, you will find yourself in a sandbox-like situation. Those things being said, there is no real sandbox, just those factors. However, it is possible to overcome domain age to quickly rank if the other factors are optimized. Though, since they can't be done too quickly, it still takes time anyway. So, either way you cut it, for the purposes of your question I would say 3 months. I hope that helps. It's nice to talk to someone who knows a little something about it! Let me know if I can ever do anything for you.

Foremost Media has a team of dedicated search engine marketing professionals that can help you come up with and implement a online marketing plan for your website. Whether your site is brand new or has been around for a while and just needs some help, contact us today to get started!

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