Green marketing for small business

If you’re practising some form of sustainability or taking conscious action to limit the environmental impact of your business (for example by reducing waste and limiting the consumption of resources) then you’re already on your way towards greening your business – and your marketing.

For example, if you owned a shoe shop, you might decide that both morally, and from a brand positioning point of view, you’d like to become more sustainable and more environmentally sensitive.

First you might find a supplier of “green energy”, change all your light fittings to compact fluorescent light bulbs, ditch the 1950’s delivery van for a hybrid, and install water-efficient taps in the tea-room. Already you’re a greener business than you were before!

The next step will be to communicate your environmental credentials to your business partners, clients and consumers. This is the most basic form of green marketing and communications.

“ It’s vital that you’re providing a high quality product though, as most consumers want to do the right thing environmentally, but not at the cost of quality or performance. ”

Jane is a conscious consumer, and next time she’s shopping for a pair of shoes, she may just remember the marketing messages about the increased sustainability of your business and choose your shop over a competitor, simply because the values you’re displaying are in line with her own.

Of course, you could take your commitment to greening your business even further by only sourcing footwear that’s made from recycled materials or committing to making your business carbon neutral. The more extensive your sustainability program, the more you’ll have to talk about in your marketing, and the more credibility you’ll have as an environmentally ethical business. And it’s quite possible you’ll receive more of Jane’s loyalty at the same time.

It’s vital that you’re providing a high quality product though, as most consumers want to do the right thing environmentally, but not at the cost of quality or performance. Don’t let your brand’s focus become limited by wearing green-coloured glasses. It’s a balancing act, and being sustainable should be just one of the attributes that your brand is known for.

Green marketing can leverage off a small sustainable outcome or a large one. Either way, it’s vitally important that you don’t overstate the truth. Not only is it morally wrong, it’s also illegal.

In the next article in this three-part series I’ll discuss the deceptive practice known as green-washing, and outline your legal obligations. The final article will cover the golden rules for creating a greener business.

Do environmental issues influence your decisions, either as a business owner or a consumer? Please share you thoughts about green marketing with us all.

Source: Green marketing

Old School Marketing

It is popular to talk about social media, influentials and Web 2.0. But does that mean the old school marketing has stopped working?

No, it means that there are more ways to reach people and depending on your target market, you have more options that all may be less effective than in the past when there were fewer options (and more people condensed into fewer communication channels.)

Mobile SEO and its optimization

Mobile search engines remain baffling entities to many advertisers and mobile marketers eager to harness the emergent power of mobile search. Unlike the traditional web, mobile search engines – to a degree – represent a different animal; a collective body defined by elusive bots and complicated algorithms. But, in the big picture, optimizing websites for those using mobile search engines shouldn’t be as intimidating or confusing as it proves to be for so many.

When it comes to search engine optimization, SEO is SEO through and through. And SEO best practices for the traditional web should not be totally disregarded when developing an SEO plan for your mobile ambitions. Heading tags, title tags, and alt tags, for example, remain vital to mobile SEO and should be heavily emphasized.

While there are myriad strategies – some complex, other simplistic – that can be applied to a variety of mobile marketing efforts, according to Bryson Meunier, Associate Director of Content Solutions at Resolution Media, basic mobility, as an example, remains one of the most important factors in cultivating a successful mobile presence rooted in effective SEO.

“Mobility is a ranking factor for mobile search,” says Meunier, “and not optimizing a mobile site could make it more difficult to appear in competitive nonbranded searches where mobility is a factor. Likewise, having an optimized mobile site could make it easier to appear for competitive nonbranded keywords where mobility is a factor.”

From exposing your brand to ultimately defining it, the masterful usage of mobile SEO can never be undervalued. And with IDC estimating that there will be in excess of one billion users of the mobile web by the end of 2010, there will also be no shortage of opportunities for discovery as a result of your mobile SEO efforts – no matter how big or small.

Source: Mobile SEO

Mobile Learning:Enhance your Knowledge

As a student or a trainee, you may be quite busy with study and work. “I don’t have enough time to learn more.” “The current study methods are too stiff.” Complaints like these are heard a lot. Then how will you change this situation for more flexible study? Learning through mobile devices, professionally known as mobile learning, or mLearning is a good choice to improve your learning efficiency. This innovative form of study had become a hot topic in recent years.

Social Marketing.A must see and a must share

Marketing. Social Marketing Youtube.A must see and a must share

What is Social Marketing?
The health communications field has been rapidly changing over the past two decades. It has evolved from a one-dimensional reliance on public service announcements to a more sophisticated approach which draws from successful techniques used by commercial marketers, termed “social marketing.”

Digital Election

More than 40 years after the invention of the internet, politicians finally sense there must be more to electioneering than posters, press conferences and party political broadcasts. What took them so long?

Pathways to improve Websites Brand Voice

The web is your company’s digital front door. Nearly everyone on the planet can be at your dot-com welcome mat with a few key strokes, ready to take a look around. So what happens next? That’s the real moment of truth, where impressions are made and customers are won and lost on a massive scale. As technology advances, the online experience and the expectations that customers bring to it are evolving. What was a best practice yesterday may no longer be necessary, and what you didn’t even realize is now a must-have.