The Lovable Marketing Blog by Carrie Gallagher

March 16, 2016 By Carrie Gallagher

The Small Business Cheat Sheet for Cost-Effective Digital Marketing

Author: digitalmarketinginstitute.com

Ireland’s small businesses have far lower digital skills than other organisations, according to our recently published Digital Skills Report. We tested the skills of 622 marketers with a set of 52 questions across the core digital marketing disciplines of SEO, PPC, Email, Display, Social, Mobile and Analytics. The result? Small businesses scored a shocking 25% lower than medium-sized businesses and 22% lower than start-ups.

It makes sense: small business have less staff, fewer resources and often lower budgets.

Read More at digitalmarketinginstitute.com

March 15, 2016 By Carrie Gallagher

Is modern SEO more than the sum of independent parts?

Author: Jayson DeMers

When you think of SEO, what do you actually think about? If you were going to “practice” SEO, what would you be doing? Would you be writing content? Analyzing your performance? Engaging with your audience on social media?

Modern SEO is a complex, multifaceted collection of different sub-strategies, nearly all of which can function independently on their own as a way to boost brand visibility and build customer relationships. As a quick example, content marketing is a necessary strategy for SEO, but even without a deliberate SEO process, it can be valuable in terms of increasing customer engagement and building brand trust.

17 B2B email marketing examples for every B2B email marketing strategy

Author: Steven MacDonald

Email is the undisputed king of B2B marketing.

For lead generation, 87% of B2B marketers’ use email marketing to generate new leads, while 31% of B2B marketers’ cite email marketing as the channel that makes the biggest impact on revenue.

In terms of return on investment, the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) found that email marketing delivers a $40 return for every $1 spent.

It’s numbers like these that makes email marketing so valuable. But, how are you using email marketing for your business? And what email initiatives will you focus on in 2016?

Visual Content: A Case For Beautiful

Author: forbes.com

When it comes to content, marketers first tend to focus on written content—articles, posts, white papers, newsletters, pages, tweets. While I started out as a copywriter, what I’ve learned as a creative director and later as a content strategist is the mega-power of visually-driven forms. Videos. Photos. Illustrations. Infographics. Slideshare presentations, Pinterest boards, Snapchats. Animated GIFs. And, yes, maybe even those silly Vines. Just look at the variety of visual storytelling with my puppy Nora below.

Lessons from the sports world: How all marketers can drive “fanatic” brand engagement

Author: Sanjay Dholakia

I’m often asked which industries are experiencing the most growth within their marketing departments, or even which sectors are most open to adopting marketing technology. Surprisingly, in the last few years, the world of sports and entertainment marketing has emerged as an industry of rapid adoption, with franchises looking for new and inventive ways to connect with their fans.

This is an important shift: Promoting sports has long been a quintessential traditional marketing exercise, with glossy magazine spreads and television advertisements winning the day.