FAQs

What is the first step in working with Cindy Bagaus Marketing Services?

A face-to-face meeting starts the process where Cindy will ask questions about your business goals, your competitors and more. Following that she will conduct an audit of your marketing materials, your web site if you already have one and your competition. She will study all this with a "marketing eye" developed over 20 years in marketing communications. A report will be produced with suggestions on how to improve your communications, online marketing tools you may want to consider, and next steps.

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What if we don’t know your business or industry?

You might be reluctant to hire someone who is not familiar with your line of work. After all, your website needs to read as if you wrote it and you're the expert. Beginning with efficient research of your business and industry, we write compelling, search engine optimized website content .

Plus, Cindy Bagaus is a quick study and communicator. She has experience working with many types of companies and non-profits, but she also has a network of talented freelance writers in vertical markets such as finance, retail, health care, etc.

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Why Are Words So Important On The Web?

After you have a well built site, your written content is the most important element of your web site. Words, headlines and phrases do much more than inform visitors and increase brand awareness. They serve as terrific fodder for viral marketing, driving many more customers to your site. Fresh copy added on a regular basis, with linked keyword-rich-phrases, is essential for bringing customers to your site and engaging them once they have arrived. By posting news and fresh copy to your site – and pushing news releases to the online newswires – the "crawlers" will find your keywords and link back to your site.

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What is SEO Content Writing?

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization, which means your website content is written to be found by the top search engines. Choose keywords related to your industry and based on search frequency and cost-per-click value. Keyword phrases consist of 3+ words that collectively are more specific than one word by itself.

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What are RSS feeds and how do they benefit me?

RSS Feed (Really Simple Syndication) is now a standard information delivery format for your customers and is preferred by journalists. When people subscribe to your feed, they get notified each time you add content such as headlines, news releases, articles and events. One of the easiest ways to get content into the market is via a news room on your site with RSS feeds. Your web site developer or one of ours can easily and affordably add a feed for you.

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What is Web 2.0?

According to suite101.com, "Many people have heard the term "Web 2.0" thrown around over the last few years without knowledge of what it means or how it differs from Web 1.0. Although the term suggests a new version of the Internet, it does not refer to an update to any technical specifications, but to changes in the ways software developers and end-users use web sites.

Essentially, Web 2.0 is an innovative, interactive way at creating and administering web sites.

The term Web 2.0 first originated in when it was used at the first O'Reilly Media conference in 2004. Web 2.0 is essentially a participatory web experience, whereas Web 1.0 was a read-only experience."

What are podcasts and vidcasts?

An audio or video recording made available on the internet, for which some method of subscribing is in place so that episodes can be downloaded or the user automatically notified. Their usage is endless…discussions, debates, education, entertainment and more.

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What is Social Media?

According to suite101.com: Anyone cognizant about innovations in internet technology and computer mediated communication streams (whether for business purposes or personal discourse), has probably noticed the surge in usage of interactive membership communities, more commonly known as "social networks" and "social media." New research by Knowledge Networks states 83% of the entire online population, aged 13 to 54, now use the internet to engage in social media.

Twitter is all the rage right now, becoming ever more popular and widely used, even as the micro blogging website allows only 140 characters (a "tweet") to be posted at a time. But the beauty of those in-the-now, concise messages is that they are posted to a world wide audience. Like similar online networks which have come before (The Globe, Friendster), and those that remain (FaceBook, MySpace), social media presents a brave new world for anyone remotely involved in the business of selling or communicating about products and/or services.

Suddenly, it doesn't matter if a company is focused on marketing, or public relations, or sales. The social web requires that businesses cast as wide a net as possible (cross channel and multi-channel communications). To flourish in this environment, businesses must integrate a comprehensive strategy for growing and retaining consumers. This means putting a marketable brand in front of the target audience, wherever they may be.

And, as the numbers show, more people (potential consumers all) are using online social media networks. Businesses must therefore develop a better understanding of social media marketing and social network communications in order to succeed now, and in the future.

Social media marketing involves using membership spaces to engage and connect to an audience of potential customers in the language and in the places they are accustomed to. Put simply, if prospective customers are using online, social networking communities, then that's where an organization's outbound marketing messages should be.

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