Category: Marketing

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Why is Digital Marketing Important in E-commerce?

Why is Digital Marketing Important in E-commerce

Technology is developing at a rapid pace, forcing businesses to keep up. Digital marketing practices are becoming more prevalent in business promotions, online presence, and revenue generation. The development of technology has created an urgency for businesses to establish an online presence. Traditional marketing methods alone cannot meet the increasing survival needs of a business. A significant role in business growth is played by digital marketing, as the world is moving towards a digital age.

E-commerce and Digital Marketing

E-commerce can use Digital Marketing to acquire more customers and build its brand value to increase revenue. Before buying a product, consumers check reviews across all platforms where the product is available before relying on content or word-of-mouth. The social network helps increase website traffic, which leads to more sales, which account for 85% of all sales.

Digital Marketing helps E-commerce businesses overcome such challenges by grabbing customers’ attention since they get distracted easily. E-commerce businesses need to grab customers’ attention since they easily get distracted.

Marketing your products online

Nowadays, a majority of people live a digital lifestyle, and almost no one is not actively using electronic systems management media. As a result, online marketing is growing every day. Using digital marketing properly, E-commerce businesses can connect with clients easily through online networking.

Reach mass audiences simultaneously.

The Internet has millions of users worldwide and is growing and expanding daily. Digital marketing channels are the best way to reach out to a large number of customers at the same time if you own your own business. Due to the ease of email communication, businesses no longer have to send individual letters to every customer. Instead, the company saves time and money by sending one email to multiple customers simultaneously. For this, we can use social media marketing services.

A digital marketing campaign influences a customer’s buying decision.

As the internet has become more accessible, consumers are curious and want to conduct thorough research before buying anything online. It has become easier for consumers to research, compare, experiment, and then make a suitable purchase decision as almost every brand markets its products and services online. As brands heavily rely on online information for their decisions, having a solid online presence is imperative.

A consumer’s engagement with a business, discounts, and customer support can influence their purchase decisions and increase their loyalty to the company.

A brand with excellent digital word of mouth is more likely to be trusted.

Massive growth in sales

Digital marketing is the easiest way to increase sales in the short term. People are more likely to try your products and services if they see a simple advertisement since online shopping is so convenient. In addition, a loyal following of customers will develop if your services appeal to them.

Comparatively, digital marketing is less expensive.

The cost of marketing online is much lower than traditional advertising methods.

Advertisements in newspapers and magazines can cost thousands, and TV and radio can consume a company’s entire marketing budget.

The cost of digital marketing, however, is dependent on your budget.

Hire a digital marketing agency to grow

E-commerce business owners must take advantage of digital marketing consequently. Therefore, you must develop and implement such a strategy as soon as possible!

Source: linkedin.com ~ By: Softloom IT Solutions ~ Image: Canva Pro

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7 Tips To Properly Manage Your Sales Funnel

Whether you’re just getting started in business, or have a successful business up and running the fact is that sales are your company’s lifeblood. In today’s digital world, creating a website that converts visitors into leads is only the first step. The inbound marketing/sales process is exactly that… a process, one which involves moving a lead from first contact, through to the close in a series of steps. 

Lead nurturing requires management. Using various methods to continue to build trust, keep your business top of mind, provide prospects with specific valuable information, and finally offer solutions, takes time, tools, and proper management for success.

Here are some tips and tools for properly managing your sales/lead funnel in order to maximize conversions and gently guide your best prospects from first contact to the close!

What is A Sales Funnel

Ok, so this was probably covered in inbound marketing 101, but let’s recap. Your sales funnel is a “visual” representation of how you generate leads and nurture them through the sales process. If you imagine the nurturing process as a funnel, the widest part is at the top. This is basically the earliest and broadest approach you take for generating leads.

As you move through the funnel and the opening gets narrower, you are taking those original broad-based leads and further defining them. By refining your approach as you learn more about your prospects, the information you provide becomes more directed and personalized. This builds trust and guides your prospects through their buying process as they gather information and seek solutions.

Managing your sales funnel is about providing exactly the right information at exactly the right time in the process to move prospects forward, towards the sale.

Improving And Managing Your Sales Funnel

There’s often more than one right answer and different solutions to common problems, some may work better for different organizations depending on their structure. Here are some tips for managing your sales funnel more effectively.

1. Don’t Lose Focus!

Many organizations center their sales funnel management on their need (sales) rather than on the customer’s wants and needs (solutions and results). Effective nurturing centers around asking the right questions, at the right time, to the right people. Sales managers need to ask their team the right questions, and salespeople need to be comfortable asking tough questions of their customers.

Once a lead has moved through the marketing process to “qualified” status and been passed to sales, nurturing needs to continue. The right questions can lead to the right solution, but the focus needs to remain on the customer, not the sale!

2. Don’t Neglect Payment Options!

Adding a simple way to purchase your product or service once your prospect has gone beyond the initial stages of contact can accelerate the buying process. By giving customers the option to buy early, using technology like PayPal or GoogleWallet can sometimes trigger sales.

Once you’ve established the lead as qualified, (second or third contact) offering an easy way to pay can often bypass the later stages of your funnel and prompt a sale earlier in the process. Of course, avoid the hard sell! You’re still providing information at this stage, but a customer may make an impulse purchase early if the email content is targeted and a payment option is offered!

3. Don’t “Turn On” Your Sales Team Too Early!

One of the biggest mistakes companies make is “releasing the hounds” too early! The first two-thirds of the nurturing process belongs to marketing! At this point, your funnel should be called a “marketing/sales funnel!” Your two teams need to work together during the nurturing process. Aligning the tasks and goals of marketing and sales can increase your close rate significantly!

Have a logical transition point. Marketing’s job is to provide useful information and guide a prospect through your funnel until such time as they indicate that they’re ready and willing to buy. At this point, the “qualified” lead should be turned over to sales for the close!

4. Your Marketing/Sales Funnel Doesn’t Address A Prospect’s “Fears”

This is related to item one and item three. Your job in the initial stages of contact is to understand your prospect’s fears, needs, and pain points and then work to address them. Their fear is what stalls them from pulling the trigger. Each step of the process needs to be well thought out. Is your team:

    • Talking features and benefits too early instead of addressing your customer’s pain points and goals.
    • Not actively listening to a prospect’s concerns.
    • Not mirroring the customer’s words and instead using long sentences and jargon.
    • Avoiding their objections instead of seeing them as opportunities to offer solutions!

Like item one, this happens when your sales team loses their focus on the customer and instead focuses on their own fears or goals.

Tools To Help Manage Your Sales Funnel

We’ve all heard the phrase “the right tool for the job!” This applies when managing your sales funnel too. Providing your sales and marketing team with the proper tools is a key element for aligning your team’s efforts. Here are a few great tools to help manage your sales funnel.

5. CRM: Customer Relationship Management System

A good CRM is the most important tool to manage every stage of your sales funnel. Using it can help you to track leads, open deals, and your current customers. By cross-sharing CRM data between marketing and sales, you can effectively track customers from the marketing stages of your funnel and turn them over to sales when they meet certain pre-determined thresholds.

6. Email Tracking Software

Today, it’s getting harder to reach decision-makers and get their attention. They’re probably receiving hundreds of emails every day, and you need to make yours stand out! You need a strategic approach with your content to provide maximum value in every email, but you also have to be creative enough in your approach to get your emails opened.

The best way to accomplish this is by tracking your email’s open and click rates. This is pretty standard from a marketing standpoint, but these numbers were often segregated from the sales team. Part of aligning your sales and marketing teams is information sharing. By notifying sales each time a piece is opened, you give them the ability to structure their approach by understanding customer triggers. For example, offer A is generating 50% more opens than offer B. Your sales team can then focus the proper offer to the proper prospect, showing how your product can meet their needs and provide viable solutions.

7. Scheduling Software

This is a great tool. It used to take multiple emails to get a meeting booked. You sent your availability, they sent theirs and it went on and on. A scheduling tool can help you sync directly with your client’s calendars and scheduling a meeting is as easy as clicking a button.

With the proper focus, alignment between marketing and sales, and the right tools you can effectively manage your sales funnel to create more leads, better-qualified leads and close more sales. Aligning your marketing and sales efforts is an important step. Share data, goals, and processes, and watch your conversions turn into customers!

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eCommerce Digital Marketing: Real-Life Examples and Tips

eCommerce Digital Marketing

What is eCommerce and Digital Marketing?

Electronic commerce (eCommerce), part of the broader economic field of digital commerce, enables business owners to sell products and services online. It allows users to browse eCommerce marketplaces, purchase physical items, consume videos or other content, purchase services, and even trade with other users on the platform.

eCommerce digital marketing enables businesses to drive awareness and traffic to online stores and convert website visitors into customers. It can help eCommerce businesses achieve key business objectives and a high return on investment. Common eCommerce digital marketing methods include content marketing, email marketing, social media marketing, social engine optimization (SEO), and influencer marketing.

Channels for Marketing eCommerce

Here are the main channels for eCommerce marketing.

Email

Email marketing is an important digital marketing channel that is easy to automate. You can set up a campaign that sends periodic emails to subscribers based on interest. However, handling the email lists correctly is essential to maintain consumer trust. For instance, customers prioritizing data privacy are often unwilling to receive commercial emails.

Content

Content marketing includes written and visual content like photos, videos, and infographics. This content engages consumers on blogs and other platforms to increase customer conversion rates and raise brand awareness. This marketing approach is low-cost but often takes a long time to generate results.

Social Media

Many brands maintain social media pages and publish regular posts to communicate with consumers and cultivate their online presence. Social media marketing campaigns differ based on the brand and platform—not all networks will suit your needs. The success of an eCommerce marketing campaign, especially on social media, relies on engaging visuals to draw traffic.

SEO and Paid Advertising

Paid advertising services like pay-per-click and SEO help reduce the marketing burden on internal teams. They help generate fast results and require less effort. SEO is an organic marketing approach that customizes content according to the most searched keywords to make it more visible on search engines.

Influencers

Influencers support various eCommerce marketing techniques by engaging with audiences and establishing trust.

Display Advertising

Display advertising involves using visual ad formats like banner ads to advertise products on apps, websites, and social media platforms. Display ads use visual media such as images, texts, and videos to capture the attention of prospective users, helping brands reach new customers and retain existing ones.

eCommerce Digital Marketing Examples: Acquisition

Here are some examples of eCommerce marketing:

Content Marketing

Blogs are a useful way to share stories, answer customer queries, and notify consumers of new products. Targeted, SEO-optimized blog posts are the best way to provide comprehensive information and engage customers. For instance, Au Lit FineLinens successfully used blog posts to sell bedding products, with informative articles providing tips for a better sleep experience.

Social Media Marketing

Social media is another avenue to reach consumers directly, expand your company’s audience, and generate leads. You can share most content types via a social media platform, including images of products, videos of the manufacturing process, and links to press releases.

For instance, Etsy leveraged this strategy and embraced all the major social media platforms (Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc.). Etsy posts videos and images of its products with calls-to-action captions to attract customers and promote sales.  

Video-Based Marketing

Video content is a popular medium for content marketing, helping to engage with consumers. Short videos and animations can help captivate your audience and convey information in a convenient format, even offering entertainment value to attract attention. For example, the

eCommerce apparel platform Nine Line adopted video-based marketing to showcase products with humorous, 30-second YouTube videos.

eCommerce Digital Marketing Examples: Conversion Optimization

Here are some examples of how eCommerce marketing can help optimize conversion.

Cart Nudges

A cart or checkout nudge is a cue that implicitly directs customers toward the checkout. For instance, this Calvin Klein nudge suggests the product is in limited stock, urging customers to purchase now.

Cart nudges shouldn’t be forceful or interfere with the shopping experience but can boost the overall marketing efforts when strategically placed.

In this example, the goal gradient at the top of the page encourages people to move forward by showing their progress within the shopping process.  

Recommendations

Product recommendations help increase sales by cross-selling based on users’ shopping history. For instance, you can recommend similar products.

These recommendations help shoppers compare products and guide decision-making. Some eCommerce stores offer recommendations for complementary products, such as additional items to complete the outfit.

Exit-Intent Overlays

An exit-intent overlay can prevent potential shoppers from leaving the eCommerce website by offering discounts and promotions, announcing new products, or nudging customers to subscribe.

For example, Wilson Street uses an exit-intent overlay that encourages visitors to join a savings club and receive 15% off their first order.

Tips for a Successful eCommerce Digital Marketing Strategy

Focus On the Shopping Cart

Users can abandon shopping carts because they do not trust the brand, the product, or the delivery system. Ideally, you should help customers see they can buy from your e-commerce business without hesitation.

You can minimize shopping cart abandonment in several ways, including providing money-back guarantees, offering superior delivery options, displaying a simple and clear return policy, and giving immediate access to customer support.

Follow Up After the Purchase

Once a user makes a purchase, you can send a post-purchase follow-up email to maintain a relationship with the customer and assess if they have more interest in your product line. Since you need their permission to keep the conversation going, you should ask them to sign up for emails during checkout.

A post-purchase follow-up email can also help show customers that your brand cares about them and wants them to use your product successfully. It lets you get feedback on their purchase experience, reducing friction for future customers. Common examples include asking customers for a product review or offering content on how to use the product.

Leverage User-Generated Content (UGC)

UGC provides brands with free promotional content created by users. It helps drive traffic to eCommerce stores and build an authentic following of users already interested in your products. It enables you to promote and share your business by engaging with customers and creating meaningful relationships.

Here are effective methods you can use to drive UGC:

    • Competitions—customers who enter competitions can win by displaying your products in some meaningful way online.
    • Review platforms—ask customers to share feedback about products they purchased through your eCommerce website.
    • Social media hashtags—ask users to submit content using a specific branded hashtag you have created for UGC.

Implement a Responsive Website Design

You must build a responsive eCommerce site to ensure users can browse from any device, including smartphones, laptops, and tablets. In today’s technology-connected world, users expect immediate access at any time and any location and from any device. A responsive design adapts your website to any resolution, ensuring a positive user experience.

Source: cloudinary.com ~ Image: cloudinary.com & Canva Pro

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Impact Of Digital Marketing Channels On eCommerce

digital marketing channels

In today’s dynamic business landscape, digital marketing has evolved into a cornerstone for enterprises across diverse industries, becoming indispensable for not only survival but also robust growth. Nowhere is its impact more palpable than in the realm of eCommerce, where the fusion of digital strategies opens doors to unprecedented reach and returns on investment (ROI). In this article, we delve into the pivotal role digital marketing channels play in shaping the trajectory of eCommerce businesses, exploring diverse avenues that can propel your enterprise to new heights.

So, to grow your eCommerce business, here are some examples of digital marketing channels that you can use, and why they are important.

You Can Market Your Product Online

Today, products are not advertised through physical stores alone. Digital marketing has changed the way people are buying and selling products or services all around the world. You can easily find any product or service online whether it is a local food shop or an international one.

For example, Balkan food used to be only available in Balkan, but today you can easily find that food or reach your audience for such food anywhere in the world. That is how eCommerce and digital marketing have made Balkan Store easily available to people who want to try new things, and it goes for any international food store!

You Can Reach Millions of People Fast

As almost everyone is present online, you can easily reach millions of people instantly. Digital marketing uses various channels to reach people and instead of waiting for your audience to find you, you can easily be visible to everyone in your target audience and potentially get new users and buyers. You can use various digital marketing tools that can pull customers or the right prospects at the right time within minutes.

It Can Help You Scope the Competition

Today, competition in every niche is high and it can be hard to stay on top of the competition without using digital marketing. With it, you can easily “spy” on your competition, see what they are doing to improve ROI and sales, and even borrow some of their strategies to boost your own business. Surviving is almost the only way to keep the business successful among many competitors and marketing can make this whole process smooth.

Buying Decisions Impact

What’s more, digital marketing and the right strategy can impact the buying decisions of your customers. Also, you can attract customers to your site and smoothly make them buy your products. You can prompt them to buy the products from the empty shopping basket and to stand out from the competition you can adopt diverse digital marketing channels and tactics to attract new customers and keep the loyal ones.

Organic Channels

The best way to utilize digital marketing to boost your eCommerce business is to use organic and unpaid channels. These include all the visits that come through search engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc. since millions of people use them to search for products and services.

You would have to optimize your product pages well in order to target potential keywords that people may be searching for when looking for products. Also, there are other channels in digital marketing that you can use to boost your eCommerce.

Email Marketing

This is a good tool that has impacted the eCommerce business a lot. You can use email marketing to remind your users and customers about new sales, new products, promotions, etc. Also, you can reach thousands of people with emails by using platforms like Mail Chimp for example.

You can also design weekly or monthly newsletters for your customers and offer a peek into your products in the form of a digital catalog that people can explore and visit your site.

Paid Search Engines

With paid search engines you can reach millions of people that are looking for products online. You can use platforms like Google Ads, Bing Ads, and Yahoo Ads to make your pages visible to everyone. By using the right keywords, you can easily reach new customers with these ads which will eventually end up in conversions.

Content Marketing

Today, content is king since with great content you can win big milestones. Content can be in the form of blog articles, videos, and images and it is up to you to choose and utilize them in the best way possible. You can write good blogs about your products or trends related to your products and business overall.

Many giants in the eCommerce world today leverage content marketing as a big tool since it can majorly influence how people behave. So, never ignore content marketing in your digital strategies for boosting your eCommerce.

Social Media

This is probably the most used channel in digital marketing today. Many eCommerce businesses have their own social media platforms which they can use for advertising and reaching out to customers. Everyone uses Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and many other platforms both as users and businesses and these make the perfect channels for connecting with people and potential buyers.

Also, you can easily promote your business and products in the most creative ways and by being original. Social media are good and affordable, making them the perfect digital marketing channel of today. What’s more, you can greatly impact the buying decisions and habits of your consumers by sponsoring your posts on social media and creating great interactive content for your profiles.

Affiliate Tools

Affiliate tools are all the channels where you can advertise your products on other websites and affiliate partners. Also, these play a major role in boosting your sales for your eCommerce business, and many giants in the industry use affiliate channels to boost their business.

Digital marketing has made a major impact on any industry and every business. Consequently, it has made a great positive impact on eCommerce businesses and helped them be more visible. Digital marketing holds many strategies, channels, and opportunities for advertising, creating your brand, and rising above the competition. So, if you have an eCommerce business, don’t forget to invest time and money into digital marketing and you will see an increase in visits, sales, and more and more loyal customers.

eCommerce Digital Marketing Case Study: Octane Fitness

Octane Fitness Website Rebuild. Using The Octane Equipment.

Octane Fitness, a company focused on providing high-tech elliptical machines decided their website was in need of a new approach to marketing. Our team at Matchbox Design Group revamped their website along with their marketing strategy with the following techniques:

How Matchbox Design Group Can Help

At Matchbox Design Group, we go beyond recognizing the impact of digital marketing—we specialize in amplifying it. As a full-service digital marketing agency based in St. Louis, we bring a wealth of expertise to the table, offering tailored solutions that cater to the unique needs of our clients. Embracing the belief that there’s no one-size-fits-all solution, we embark on every project with a commitment to customization, ensuring your digital endeavors align seamlessly with your budget and distinctive goals.

Design Expertise:

Our proficiency in design is a testament to our keen eye for aesthetic precision. Whether you’re envisioning a marketing site to propel your company’s objectives or an eCommerce platform capable of handling high-order volumes, our website design services deliver the perfect blend of functionality and artistic flair. We craft sites that not only captivate visually but also guarantee a positive user experience.

Website Development Mastery:

The heartbeat of your online presence lies in the performance, functionality, and accessibility of your website. Our in-house team of engineers meticulously pieces together each element, ensuring a high-functioning site accessible to all users. With Matchbox Design Group, your website becomes more than a digital presence—it transforms into a dynamic platform that resonates with your audience.

SEO + Content Excellence:

Building a website is just the beginning; the next crucial step is ensuring it’s discoverable. Our dedicated SEO team, stationed in St. Louis, MO, excels in optimizing and consistently updating your site for peak performance. By formulating a holistic marketing strategy, we propel your website to reach its full potential, attracting and retaining the audience you desire.

Source: matchboxdesigngroup.com ~ By:  JAMES MCMINN ~ Image: Canva Pro

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Make Money Online By Sharing Your Knowledge

Make Money Online By Sharing Your Knowledge

One of the best ways of making money online is by sharing your knowledge with thousands of people who are willing to pay for it.

It could be a skill you picked up over time and currently use in your day job or one you learned out of curiosity. Whatever it is, if it’s valuable and can solve some problems that people face, you can make money from it.

This post covers 11 interesting ways you can use to monetize your expertise and knowledge starting today – that are actually worth your time.

How to make money online with your expertise

Here are 11 of the best ways to make money online using your expertise, skills, and knowledge.

1. Paid Newsletters

Newsletters have been around for years, but paid or premium newsletters are booming.

In fact, Substack, a startup that makes it easy for anyone to start a newsletter and get paid by the subscribers, recently raised  $ 65 million and was valued at $650 million.

Another startup, Revue, was acquired by Twitter in January 2021.

If you have some expertise that’s in demand and valuable, there are thousands of people willing to pay for it.  It could be about health, finance, business, marketing, politics, sports, or countless other categories.

But you’ll want to niche down and find an engaged audience to stand out and charge for your expertise.

For example, Scott Keyes of Scott’s Cheap Flights started with a newsletter for people looking for great flight deals. The newsletter has grown to over $320k per month with more than 2 million subscribers.

Premium members get more deals on domestic and international flights for only $49/annum– a good bargain considering they’ll save hundreds to thousands of dollars on each flight.

Similarly, you can create a niche newsletter and offer value-adding advice, guides, and resources to all readers. Then provide extra and exclusive benefits to paid members.

Your own newsletter can be focused on cryptocurrency investing, weight loss or fitness, curated children’s activities, small business accounting or marketing, and many more.

Getting started is fairly easy from the technology side. You have many options to choose from including:

    • Substack: 10% charge + the credit card fees.
    • Revue: (recently acquired by Twitter) takes 5% fees on paid newsletters
    • Patreon: charges between 5-12% on your monthly income from the platform
    • Campaignzee: a Mailchimp integration for selling subscriptions to newsletters takes a 10% cut.

2. Blogging

Another way to make money online by sharing your knowledge is by starting a blog.

Blogging isn’t just a great way to monetize your skills, it’s also a fantastic way to build your brand and get your name in front of your potential clients.

How do you make money from a blog?

One obvious way is through ads on your blog. But ads are just scratching the surface in terms of how to monetize your blog.

You can also make money by recommending products and services that’ll be valuable to your audience. Or use the blog to generate leads for your online training or courses, coaching sessions, books, and many more.

To get started, you’ll need a place to write and reach your target audience.

Medium and similar platforms make it easy to start with minimal effort for free, but you won’t have full control over your blog. Plus your options for monetizing the blog and selling your expertise will be limited.

WordPress is a better option. You can buy a domain and get WordPress hosting for cheap (as low as $3.95/month from Bluehost for example). Next, install a theme and some plugins and start publishing to your new blog.

But note…

Blogging is hard, and doing it well consistently is harder. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s actually great news for you.

It simply means if you commit to it for the long term, continue to add value to your audience, and treat it as a business, it’ll eventually pay off.

3. YouTube

YouTube is the second most visited website, just after Google.

Every day, over a billion hours of video are watched, translating to billions of views every month.

What better place to go to share your expertise to the world?

So if you love being on camera and helping people, YouTube, and vlogging in general, is another great way to earn money online.

With nothing more than your mobile phone, you can record and upload your very first video to YouTube.

Of course, you’ll want to invest in some equipment to improve the quality of your video production and come across as professional. You can start with a decent mic, camera, and light at the minimum.

You can make money on YouTube through

    1. Advertisements
    2. Channel memberships
    3. Selling your own branded merchandise
    4. Sponsored video posts
    5. Promoting other people’s products (affiliate marketing)
    6. Selling your own digital products like training, courses, ebooks, etc

And many more.

Other Skills needed: Video editing skills (and software), content research skills, and SEO knowledge. You can outsource some of these to freelancers on Fiverr or Upwork.

4. Podcasting

Podcast listening is growing in popularity and it is estimated that the number of listeners in the USA alone will reach 132 million by 2022.

With podcasting, you can share your own knowledge with listeners, and get interviewed by other podcast hosts within the same or related niche to grow your reach.

Similarly, you can also invite other podcasters to come on your show.

Let’s say your podcast is about small business accounting. Your podcast listeners will probably be interested in marketing their products and services too.

So bringing a marketing expert to your show will be a great idea.

Your listeners will get more insights on how to manage their businesses; the guest may pick up some leads and increase in their brand awareness; and you get to add to your content library.

It’s a win-win for all parties.

What do you need to get started?

    • Equipment: Headsets and microphone at the minimum.
    • Software: You’ll need to get software to edit your audio, and learn how to use it
    • Podcast hosting: A place to host your recorded and edited podcast. Some of the popular ones include Buzzsprout, SoundCloud, Captivate, Transistor, etc
    • Podcast Directories

Directories like Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, and Spotify make it easy for your podcast to be discovered by millions of potential listeners.

Check this 6,800+ words guide on How to Make a Podcast from Buzzsprout, a podcast hosting company.

5. Webinars

Webinars are live, interactive seminars done online. They’re a relatively easier and quicker way to share your knowledge.

Usually, the attendees would sign up in advance for the session and can ask questions at the end of their presentation. Webinar sessions can be as short as 30 minutes, but 1-hour sessions are fairly common.

You can make money from a Webinar by charging the attendees. Or make it free, but upsell your other products like online courses, coaching or even books.

If you’ve done a great job of delivering value during an hour free webinar, it should be easy to persuade some of the attendees to sign up for your higher-priced services.

Simply rinse and repeat as many times as you wish. Alternatively, you can create an evergreen webinar to sell your products on autopilot.

Evergreen webinars are great for teaching principles and foundational knowledge in your field. That means you can record the session once with a live audience and use it for years to come.

When you’re ready to start making money from a webinar, you’ll be able to choose from several platforms such as Podia, GotoWebinar, Zoom, and so on.

EverWebinar, Demio, and Livestorm are options for automated or evergreen webinars.

6. Online Course

Online courses are everywhere, and you’ve probably taken one in the past.

People love online courses because they can be taken on-demand, at their convenience and pace, and at a relatively cheaper cost compared to a traditional school.

So if you can create an engaging course that captures the attention of your students and improves their knowledge, you can definitely make tons of cash through online courses.

At the end of your course, the participants should walk away with a specific knowledge or skill they can use in their lives or business.

It could be as minor as learning how to tie a tie, or as significant as knowing how to play a musical instrument. Whatever it is, there should be a measurable goal and objective for your course.

How much can you charge for an online course?

You can charge anywhere from $50 to over a thousand dollars. The skills level and its complexity, course duration, and the value to the students will dictate how much you can charge for your online course.

What I love about this option for making money from your expertise is that it is relatively passive. You can create a course once and earn recurring income from it for years to come – with minimal or no updates required depending on the subject.

Another great thing is getting started is fairly easy. You can record your online course and sell it through platforms like Udemy or Skillshare.

Your course will be available to millions of potential students immediately. But in exchange, they’ll take a percentage of your course earnings and you lose some control.

Alternatively, you can host your online course on platforms like Teachable, LearnWorlds, and Podia for a flat monthly fee. However, you’ll need to do your own marketing to make good money here.

This may not be a problem if you have an existing audience. Otherwise, marketing an online course as a beginner with no track record may be hard.

But it’s doable.

One smart way of doing this is by leveraging on other people’s audience and subscribers. For example, let’s say your online course is on how to use Pinterest to drive leads for small businesses.

A quick way of getting in front of your potential students will be by reaching out to bloggers, podcasters, or Youtubers that serve small businesses. If your offer is valuable, they’ll likely be willing to partner with you.

Check below for some helpful resources to get you started:

7. Freelancing

This is a pretty straightforward and easy one. Fiverr and Upwork are 2 of the popular freelancing platforms.

There are services for anything from copywriting, graphic design, web development, content writing, SEO, and accounting to financial consulting.

Your biggest problem here is that you’ll be selling your time. So scaling your offering could be a challenge. Unless you can charge a sufficiently high rate to make it worth your while.

Another concern with freelancing platforms is the race to the bottom because of the intense competition with other freelancers.

But if you niche down, do a great job consistently, and manage to get glowing reviews, you can make it work.

Getting started is easy. You simply create an account, verify your profile, and start applying for gigs on Upwork, for example.

Fiverr lets you list the services you offer and people can reach out to you.

8. Paid Ebooks and Reports

Compared to the other ways of making money using your skills, ebooks will generally have more accessible pricing. Therefore, you can expect to make more sales from an ebook compared to, say, an online course or one-on-one coaching.

But done well, ebooks can build your brand and drive leads to your more expensive offerings.

An ebook can be anywhere from a few to hundreds of pages depending on the topic. And you can definitely put one together in a few days or weeks. Or come up with an outline and get it ghost-written for you by professional writers.

Paid reports on the other hand are usually more technical, detailed, and research-type writings for a specific industry. If you can put in the time and resources to produce well-written market research that addresses a specific area of an industry, this can be very lucrative.

And you can charge thousands of dollars for your report.

Once you have your ebook or reports written, you can simply convert it to PDF or epub formats to sell online.

Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing makes it easy for anyone to make money by sharing their expertise and knowledge with millions of readers worldwide. It takes less than 5 minutes to self-publish your ebook and make it available on Kindle stores worldwide.

Gumroad is another alternative. You can start for free but pay a 5% cut on sales plus a payment processing charge.

Or pay $10/month to reduce their fees to 3.5%, have your own custom branding, use your own domain, and many more.

9. Group Coaching

Group coaching is another powerful way to share your knowledge while getting paid to do so.

A coaching session can be used to drive results for people looking to improve a specific area of their lives or business.

These could be about public speaking, managing a business, developing leadership skills, job search strategies, starting in a new field, growing an online business, and many more.

The possibilities are endless.

Group coaching is perfect for you if you want to establish your expertise, increase awareness for your brand, and grow your business quickly and exponentially.

You’ll be reaching more people at the same time and making more money in less time.

To really do well here, you should have great communication and facilitation skills or gradually improve the skills over time.

Your biggest challenge will be getting people signed up for your coaching sessions. But you can drive leads to your sessions using one of the other methods above or by running ads.

If you have that area covered, organizing an online group session is a piece of cake with tools like Zoom or Google Hangout.

10. One-on-one coaching

This is similar to group coaching, but the sessions are between yourself, as the coach, and a client.

Obviously, you’ll charge more for a private coaching session than a group session. Your ability to scale and make more money will be limited.

But if you charge a reasonably high price for your time, and more importantly, the value you deliver to your clients, you can have great results with one-on-one coaching.

These coaching calls can be live, over the phone, or using tools like Skype, Zoom, Google Hangout, and so on. Just pick the right one that best serves the result you are hoping to achieve for your client.

11. Mastermind Groups

Think of this as a premium and higher-priced version of group coaching sessions. Here, members of the group are not only trying to solve their own problems, but they are also helping the other group members too.

A Mastermind group is an accountability group, peer mentoring group, success team, and support group – all rolled into one.

If you have the expertise in a specific area with track record of excellent results, you can make loads of money from organizing mastermind groups.

You can meet monthly, quarterly, or as often as you think is suitable for the goals you’re trying to achieve.

Mastermind groups can be used for entrepreneurship, investing, writing, and so on.

Best way to make money with your Knowledge and Expertise

The best way to make money online is the one that utilizes your existing skills and expertise, has the potential to scale, and provides a good balance between the efforts you put in and the money you make.

Beyond the expertise, each of the 11 ways to make money by sharing your knowledge covered above requires additional skills at varying levels. Blogging, newsletters, and ebooks will require some basic writing skills for instance.

That means the best one for you will vary depending on your unique situation and abilities. For example, selling a coaching program or mastermind group program may be easier if you already have an audience or know how to get in front of one.

Are you comfortable speaking in front of a camera? Then webinars or YouTube could be for you. Otherwise, you can start with a blog, ebook or freelancing.

Ultimately, you will have to combine a few different options to really maximize your earning potential. With careful planning, you can create a value ladder that combines different offerings at varying price points and value to your client.

Here’s an example using Susan, a sales and marketing expert. She can combine several offers into a value ladder that looks like this:

    1. Free PDF download of the “7 low-cost ways to generate leads” through her blog, Youtube and Podcast
    2. Automated Sales Funnel System ebook for $29
    3. Get More Sales Using LinkedIn Course for $97
    4. Ultimate Sales Training for Entrepreneurs for $597
    5. Sales Blueprint Group Coaching Program for $2,000
    6. One-on-one coaching with Susan for $5,000
    7. Access to her Mastermind group for $1,000/month or $10,000 per annum.

Each level in her value ladder provides more value to her clients. And of course, more money for her.

Conclusion

Sharing your expertise, skills, and knowledge can change your life beyond just the money you can make from it.

It can make you a recognized leader in your area, build your reputation and ultimately generate more leads for your business.

And the best part is: You don’t have to be 10x more knowledgeable in an area to make money by teaching others what you know.

In many instances, you just need to be a few steps ahead of them. That means you don’t need a formal education or certification to get started in most cases.

So take action today and get started with one of the online money-making options covered in this post.

If you loved this post, please consider sharing it on your favorite social media. Have any questions or anything to add? Let me know in the comment section.

Source: walletbliss.com ~ By: Simon Ikuseru ~ Image: Canva Pro

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