by Slingshot Bloggers
Led by Slingshot SEO team member Jim Brown and consisting of 18 presentations attended by 202 online marketing experts, MBO 2010 was nothing short of a success. Attendees arrived around 8:00 a.m. for check-in and then proceeded to hear keynote speaker Mark Roberge of HubSpot share his intellect on the evolving media and technological space of inbound marketing. It was great to see social media tactics actually being implemented during his presentation: many iPhones and other smart phones were being raised in the air periodically to capture Twitpics!
He touched on the important points of creating a successful campaign from beginning to end: SEO, blogging, social media for lead generations, and conversions rates for measurement. Our team was happy to hear Mark speak of the power and importance of SEO—one eye-catching statistic he provided: inbound leads cost 60% less than outbound leads.
After the keynote speaker, attendees were given the choice of hearing one of three speakers every hour for six sessions. Categories of speakers covered all aspects of online business, including “Understanding Your Audience,” “Choosing Your Platform,” and “Real World Case Studies.” Ryan Mull from Imavex talked about the human side of search engine marketing and what marketers can do to ensure successful search campaigns. Alessandra Souers from Affordable Style presented on the art of email marketing and how to test campaigns to continuously provide personalization and lead growth.
Her advice included running several tests on different variables including calls to action, headline, time of day, time zones, sender names, etc. Alessandra offered several resources to the crowd, including the Retail Email Blog (already bookmarked to my Firefox) and the “coming soon” Emailium, an email marketing campaign database for comparison and analysis. James Burnes from Mobiltopia spoke of the shift of using mobile devices, describing the modern consumer as “always on, everywhere connected.” Other speakers advised their audience on how to create an owner-friendly website and a fully functioning corporate blog. The end result of most online marketing tactics that were discussed was, of course, an increase in lead generations and ROI.
Overall, MBO 2010 provided a day of learning, networking, and information sharing. When one technique used by an Indiana company is shared with another local company, the companies and the entire economy both benefit. The day provided insight into some of Indiana’s greatest minds, and we are already marking our calendars for next year!
Ten Main Marketing Tactics I learned at MBO:
- “BYOI” (Build Your Own Inbox of Newsletters): reference, critique, and evaluate the email marketing strategies of competitors and industry leaders.
- Continuously test your email-marketing campaign. There is always something to test and improve upon.
- Make your website mobile friendly or create a website specifically for mobile devices.
- Add your company or service to Google’s Business Solutions.
- Have a plan! Create a content plan for all situations and refer to it when facing those situations.
- Moderate all dialog that revolves around your company; answer all questions and feedback.
- All online marketing efforts act cohesively; push Twitter and FB through blogging and vice versa.
- Create a voice and use it through all platforms.
- Make your website easy to use, easy to find, and easy to update.
- If you are in charge of updating web content, store your website as your homepage. Update it everyday!