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Balancing Budget With Quality in Software Marketing

Rebecca Graves
By Rebecca Graves on October 05, 2016
shutterstock_204449359.jpg
shutterstock_204449359.jpg

Balancing Budget With Quality in Software Marketing

Rebecca Graves
By Rebecca Graves on October 05, 2016

software-marketing

Successful software marketing doesn't come cheap. You pay for all kinds of products and services designed to drive business towards your inbound marketing web, including your website design and maintenance, content creation, social media updates, analytics and so on.

Then, consider that the average small business spends about $9K to 10K on AdWords or other PPC campaigns—and the budget becomes tangible. If you aren't seeing the ROI you want from your marketing budget, it's time to balance that budget with quality.

Quality Over Quantity is Always the Name of the Inbound Game

Here is where to place the focus when you're ready to balance a ballooning marketing budget with inbound marketing practices that actually pay off—and net profits.

Invest in a responsive website design

This "little" tip packs a powerful punch. The first impression you make on visitors is oh-so-important. Visitors bounce quickly. According to Stanford University's Website Credibility Study, 46.1% of website visitors determine your credibility based on website design; 28.5% on information design and structure.

If you lack quality in these two areas, you've already lost more than half of your potential client base.

By investing in a responsive website design, you ensure that colors, logo(s), layout, formatting and content please the audience and that the design/content continues to evolve in response to the user experience (UX).

Prioritize the right content and SEO will follow

We notice that many of our new clients come to us using outdated SEO habits that are hard to break. Namely, they fixate on their preferred keywords and phrases, and they want to build all their content accordingly. Unfortunately, this can lead to repetitive and fluffy content rather than content that is designed to meet a new visitor and hold their hand as they move deeper and more confidently into your software marketing sales funnel.

Instead, map your content with a focus on the UX, wherever that U may be. Start by creating a content inventory list and then map it all to a mock sales funnel (white board time?). This will show which parts of the funnel are missing content so you can fill in the gaps.

Plan to spend about one business quarter per offer and that should help you seal the gaps. When all is said and done, you'll have a tighter connection between content pieces, offers, and social media posts. After that, you'll have a better idea of how to create new content cycles.

Tighten up those PPC campaigns

Let's start with one of the biggest money-sucking marketing ploys out there: PPC campaigns. The great news is that these campaigns get your company above-the-fold on SERPs for preferred keyword phrases, and that should significantly increase website visits. Increased website visits should inevitably lead to increased conversions and sales.

The bad news: They don't always, do they?

Here's where quality really matters. Don't spend a single penny on your PPC budget unless you know the campaigns are smartly crafted and intricately laid out and that the links go to highly-optimized landing pages that are more likely to convert.

  • Pick keywords/phrases that match where a buyer is in the cycle.
  • Nurture beginning- and middle-funnel buyers.
  • Link to relevant pages and offers that match the initial click (not your homepage or some other generic form).
  • Make sure the landing pages are custom-crafted for that particular PPC ad to really tighten things up.

You'll find that using PPC ads to nurture leads will provide more and higher-quality leads than bottom-funnel promotions that fail to come through.

When you embody the reality that quality always trumps quantity, your software marketing approach will be more genuine—and fruitful.

Rebecca Graves
Published by Rebecca Graves

Rebecca Graves co-founded Spot On in 2012. As a partner and leader of client services, she takes immense pride in being in charge of “client happiness.” The role allows her to wield her problem-solving skills while fostering big-picture perspectives and team building. Rebecca’s more than 35 years of experience have equipped her to translate strategic planning expertise for the advancement of tech companies transforming the healthcare, financial, and legal industries.

To learn more about Rebecca, visit our Company Page.

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