5 Digital Marketing Mistakes, Once Fixed, Can 10X Your Online Sales Conversions Within Minutes (Part 1 of 2)

If you're committing just ONE of these five digital marketing mistakes you could be costing your business MILLIONS in revenue dollars

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By William Ballard

​When was the last time you read a headline that did nothing but lead you down a road into fairy-tale land?
In fact, consider some of these “too good to be true” promises:

• “This software can make you $100K a year in five minutes a day.” I’m not much of an engineer or coder or hacker, but I’m calling baloney on this one!
• “Start this nutrition plan today and lose 20 pounds by the end of the week.” Take it from someone who is trying to gain weight — it’s just as hard to gain weight as it is to lose it. I’m calling baloney on this one too!
• “Five-second strategies that can help you find the romantic partner of your dreams within minutes.” Really? Anyone who knows anything about relationships knows that in order to make a truly intimate and unbreakable connection with a significant other takes a lifetime, not a few minutes — and certainly not five-seconds. Nope! I’m calling baloney here too!

Now, with all that said, trust me: I’m not here to take you down the fairy-tale lane. I’m here to give you some tried and true, practical insights that every digital marketer and small business owner needs to know in order to truly and legitimately grow their business.

Related Article: Content Marketers: 3 Ways to Make Your Content More Engagement Worthy

You’ve heard of the Pareto Principle — the idea that 80% of your results come from only 20% of the actual work you do?

Well, in the “ guru” industry — the industry that builds its fortune off taking advantage of your disadvantage — what they do is assess your current efforts, and based off the Pareto Principle (they look at the 20% of what you’re doing), they’re able to pinpoint the top few important problems or challenges that your business is facing, of which, they can address and fix quickly.

That way, the faster they can get you to perceive them as being knowledgeable about your business and a genius in your industry, the faster they can take advantage of you.

Well, unlike those guys, my objective here is not to take advantage of your disadvantage, but rather, to improve your disadvantage so that it transforms into an advantage for you.
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Therefore, if you’re just starting to use the web to market your business there are a few important things that most new entrepreneurs, small business owners, and digital marketers get wrong in the beginning.
Look through this list of five mistakes and if you see any one of these happening in the marketing of your business this week, I suggest taking some time to clean them up.

Digital Marketing Mistake #1:

Where’s Your Call-to-Action?

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Even large corporations, who have massive marketing budgets, can miss the mark on this one — so don’t feel so bad.

However, this mistake, by far, is probably the most costly. Let me just be blunt for a moment and say this: Every single communication you send out needs to have a call-to-action. And I do mean EVERY single communication you send out.

It doesn’t matter what that communication is. Whether you are trying to get someone to sign up for your email list or wanting someone to sign a petition, you need to tell them what to do.

The most successful digital marketers and direct-response style copywriters consider this to be the fastest way to make your marketing copy more effective and proficient.

Moreover, your call-to-action should be simple and straight to the point. Trying to be super cute and clever won’t help you here.

If you want someone to click a link to sign up for your awesome newsletter, use the words Click here to sign up for our awesome newsletter now.
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Action Step This Week: Look through each of the key pages on your site. Do you have clear call-to-action (CTAs) on each page? Are they simple and straight to the point?

Fixing this mistake alone could actually accomplish the promise of 10Xing your online conversions within minutes, and we’ve just barely started this list.

Digital Marketing Mistake #2:

What Do You Do, Exactly?

Photo Credit: Post+Beam

The truth is: You’d be surprised how many small business owners and entrepreneurs I’ve worked with that seem to consistently make this BIG marketing no, no.

Look, if you’re a personal trainer, the words Personal Trainer needs to be right at the top of your site. If your thing is teaching people how to play the guitar, then those words should be Learn How to Play the Guitar. If you’re a graphic designer, make sure the words Graphic Design is front and center.

Too many small business owners and entrepreneurs have been taught that they need to focus really hard on coming up with an inspiring vision and mission statement, which addresses what their ideal market is really looking for (and take it from someone who went to Business School, this is a very good exercise to do), however.

Just like overthinking a call-to-action, you can overthink a tag line that may sound something like this: “Supporting you in your quest for health, strength, and vitality.”

A statement like that is fine for you and your employees, those who know what type of services you provide. However, it leaves your reader or audience with no idea who you are. In fact, a statement like that could easily fit a personal trainer or even a chiropractor. Talk about confusing.

Look, I’m trying to make this as easy as possible for you.

Just like you shouldn’t be trying to be cute and clever with your call-to-action, don’t get cute and clever when you are trying to describe what it is you do.
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Use the type of language that your target market is already using. (Plus, this can also be helpful with your SEO marketing strategy.)

Related Article: 5 Ways to Write Persuasive Marketing Emails That Compel Readers to Take Action

Action Step This Week: How would a normal person describe what you do? Not your ideal client or customer, but a real-live normal, breathing human being. What type of slang or lingo do they use?

Get in the mind of your ideal client or customer. Instead of trying to create a new conversation, join in on the conversation that is already going on in their heads. This means that you are going to have to make plans to get out of the office and actually sit down and talk with your potential customers or clients.

But that shouldn’t be too difficult because you’re in the people business, with the passion to serve, are you not?

Digital Marketing Mistake #3:

I see a headline … but where’s the benefit?

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Now this one goes back to what we discussed in the introduction (as well as what we talked about in the first two mistakes).

Look, if there is ONE major thing that you get out of these two articles, it should be this: Being cute and clever will actually do you more harm than good in your marketing efforts.

You see, headlines that clearly communicate a benefit will always trump headlines that leave readers confused and guessing what they are actually about to read (even though it may be a cute attempt to play on words).

Will your readers learn how to increase their sales conversions by attending your webinar? Then that promise needs to be in your headline.

Will they discover 8 new strategies they can use to increase lead generation by reading your blog post? Then you know what promise or benefit needs to be in your headline.

There are lots of techniques for producing more effective headline copy, and you should definitely spend ample amount of time to learn and master them.

With that said, consider taking a listen to this interview I did alongside Peter Fogel for Copy Confidential, hosted by Kim Phelan of GKIC.

There you’ll learn about my “hiring and firing” metaphor that will help you find out how to find the highest achieving, top preforming headline for your product, service, or even article.

To that end, this is a tip that you can start to implement right away. And it is something that you should consider doing before you ever hit publish. It doesn’t matter what type of content it is.

Action Step This Week: Take a look at any content you have scheduled to go out live this week (blog posts, email newsletter articles, sales pages, YouTube video, social media posts, etc.)

Ask yourself: What benefit will your audience get from reading, watching, or listening to the content you have planned to send out?

Once you know what that number ONE benefit is, make sure you put it in the headline.

Related Article: 3 Core Competencies of a Highly Effective Content Marketing Specialist

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Now Over to You …

Look, if you’re like me (which I think most of you are), I know you’re busy running your business, and I don’t want to take any more of your precious time than I already have. The truth is, this article was originally 3,000+ words, which included all five of these digital marketing mistakes, but …

… as I was getting ready to publish this article I knew that you probably wouldn’t have time to get all five of these “action step” items crossed off your to-do list this week. That’s why I decided to break this article into two parts.

That way, all you have have to do is focus on just two action steps for this week. The two most important ones that I think would add the most value to your business right now. Or you could pick the main ONE you think will benefit you the most … and get it into your calendar right now.

By this time next week, it should be finished. Then, you can look at the remaining list and schedule any more action items that you think make the most sense in regards to the current season or life cycle of your business.

Are you making any of these three digital marketing mistakes in your own business? If so, which ones and which action steps are you going to start implementing this week? Let me know in the comments below.

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William Ballard is one of the most sought-after business and leadership coaches in the world. As founder and CEO of William Ballard Enterprise, his core business development and leadership programs are designed to be a catalyst for entrepreneurs and leaders who want to enhance performance and make a meaningful difference in their business, their lives, and the world.
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Of William’s many awards and accolades, his writing has appeared in Entrepreneur.com, Writer’s Digest, Wealthy Web Writer, THRIVE Global, and others. His newest book, Success in 3D: 3 Fundamental Pillars to Professional and Personal Achievement — — pre-launch party to be announced.

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