Archive for SEO

FAQ’s from our #SocialBusiness Marketing Seminar 2020

On February 6th 2020, CC Communications hosted our #SocialBusiness Marketing Seminar to focus on igniting the marketing potential of our attendees and to provide advice on how to enhance their overall brand presence.

I recorded some of their questions with my responses to help provide this information to all of our followers. If you have a question regarding your use of social media or how to better enhance your online presence, please send it forward to connie@cccommunications.ca or request a FREE 30 minute consultation.

Thank you for attending CC Communication’s #SocialBusiness Marketing Seminar which focused on helping our attendees recognize their brand’s potential and identified ways to help them #ConnectMORE


Q) How do I carve out my identity within the guidelines of a brand?

A) If your business/brand has a series of guidelines or a social media policy in place, it is always a best practice to follow those guidelines. Review the particulars of the guidelines and work to establish yourself as an employee of the organization both in the professional workplace and online. Keeping a consistent brand identity within the overall brand identity is a professional action that can help build your credibility.

Communicating your specific skills and experience on social media platforms like LinkedIn can also serve to help you build your personal brand identity within the umbrella of your organization. As this social media platform allows you to receive testimonials personally, LinkedIn is a great option for someone looking to enhance their brand identity within a brand identity.


Q) Is there any way to have our clients become more engaged and interactive online?

A) The first step would be to define your target demographic and develop an emotional appeal or educational purpose for that audience.

Understand that your audience is human and will interact with social media content in a similar manner that you do. Think of social media posts that inspire you to become engaged and interactive. Visual posts that have vivid colour and short informative videos are often very well received.

Acknowledge that SEO (search engine optimization) is very important in the development of your online content and that a “marketing plan” that addresses your overall branding goals should be in place. This is highly recommended instead of publishing content “whenever you can,” with the hope to capture interactive followers.  


Q) I am not a big “social media person.” How do I get started in building connections so I do not lose interest in being connected?

A) Start building your social media following by creating posts that inspire you.

Learn to use social media as a tool to promote your products/services to a larger audience rather than cold calling or relying on traditional forms of advertising. Social media allows for you to start a two-way conversation with your followers and answer any questions they may have directly – you can’t do that will a sign or print ad!

Social media platforms have insights and data for you to analyze and use to create future sales leads. The conversations and insights you receive provide you with feedback and further information to help you work closely with potential customers who have an interest in your business, brand, and services which should motivate you to remain socially connected.


Q) For B2B services, do you think it is important to have a Facebook/Instagram account when most clients are likely not active on these social platforms?


A) Yes! Facebook and Instagram are ideal places for businesses to showcase their story and to target an audience in a compelling, memorable, and engaging way.

Understanding what types of content to post for B2B businesses, however, will be more important to plan out in your overall marketing strategy – which every business should have and revamp routinely. The demographics for both Instagram and Facebook will be different and catering your content to attract these audiences will be different than your approach for platforms like LinkedIn or your corporate website.

Considering the wide use of Facebook and Instagram, the decision makers of an organization you would like to interact with – are likely using these platforms socially – and being visible online is imperative in 2020. If you haven’t considered using these platforms previously, now is the time.


Q) How can I analyze social media data based on people’s life experience and genuine interests? How can I generate more followers/shares, overall?

A) Ask questions. Social media is the one form of marketing (advertising) that will allow you to receive insights and data you can use to generate a “plan of action” to retain future sales leads.

Focus on building a following of genuine customers versus trying to reach a million likes or followers. This will allow you to learn more about the people who follow you, why they are following you, and how your product/service can help them.

This idea of building a genuine and authentic following has encouraged Facebook and Instagram to rethink the use of “like counts” and examine how the profiles could operate without them. Yes, that’s right… “page likes” may disappear in 2020 and push business owners to be more authentic and organic with their overall social media strategies.

Q) Facebook has regulations against “like and share” giveaways. How can I host a compliant campaign that will ensure the integrity of my business page?

Like and Share contests violate the community guidelines Facebook has established as they do not allow for administrators to actively track who has participated. With high privacy settings, participants can like and share and you would have no knowledge of this interaction.

The like and share campaigns also do not provide an administrator with proof of participation and further can compromise the integrity of your participants information as there is no official rules or request for a collection of information. Some like and shares may be “hidden” by users. This sends a signal to Facebook that you are posting low quality content and they will show your posts to less people in the future or even worse, may render your page inaccessible. Some campaigns may also violate Ontario Promotional Law as alcohol and lottery tickets are not to be given away as “prizes.”

In a compliant campaign, participants are informed about their opportunity to participant, how and if their information will be used, and are provided with a fair and equal opportunity at winning. When hosting a compliant campaign with CC Communications, you also receive quality marketing feedback from your participants WITH their permission – something a like and share cannot provide.

Interested in attending a future seminar or hosting Connie as a guest speaker at your next event? Email connie@cccommunications.ca and let’s talk!

Secrets to create Engaging Social Media Content

Over 76% of marketers report that finding quality content is the greatest marketing challenge. Posting regularly to social media requires research, familiarity with trending topics, strong communication skills and brain power!

Today, we are sharing three of CC Communications secrets to keep your social media content engaging:

Start a Conversation to #ConnectMORE 

Social media is the perfect place to #ConnectMORE with your audience and “get social” with your customers. Try posting content that is interactive. For example, ask your audience questions about their preference or personal opinion to entice a conversation.

Once your followers have started to engage with you, it is important to respond. Social media platforms make it easy to respond to followers by replying to their comments or by using the “@” symbol to speak directly with them. Other users are more likely to participate in the conversation when they view responses from the company.

In this post to the left, it is clear that the company has not made an effort to converse with their audience. Such posts are ad driven to increase sales but fail to start an interactive conversation.

If a social media user is interested in the product, they may purchase the item, however posts such as this fail to encourage conversation or social interaction. This is a disadvantage because social media interaction through the form of written conversation often spurs interest from other users who could become potential buyers of such products and/or services. 

Can you spot the difference in this Coca-Cola post for example?

It makes a point to engage followers by asking them a question, while still promoting the product.

Represent Your Brand

Sharing and reposting existing content is part of a good social media strategy, but the majority of your content should be unique and relevant to your overall products and services. People will follow your social media pages to view content that represents your business and brand.

To accurately represent your brand and preserve your image, you should avoid “clickbait.”

Clickbait is the posting of articles with attention grabbing headlines that are designed to urge users to click on a link. Due to their frequent use, Facebook officials have altered their algorithm to reduce the viewership of “clickbait” articles. This recent change was made as an overall initiative to provide the Facebook community with organic and authentic content. Have you been a victim of “clickbait?”

Think Outside of the Box and Make it Visual 

Keep your content fresh! Research and capitalize on trends people are socializing about. Include visuals that represent your brand. In doing so, your social posts become 80% more interactive according to Facebook analytics.

For example, by adding this image of a quote to the Facebook post it has become more visually stimulating and might encourage viewers to remember it’s positive message (and your brand in association).

For commercial photography, consider utilizing the photography services of CC Photography, a division of CC Communications. Also book your FREE 30 minute consultation  as our agency is driven to provide business owners with the opportunity to increase their brand awareness and build community through interactive and conversational content.

What’s SEO?

I’m glad you asked.

The three letter acronym stands for Search Engine Optimization and refers to the use of keywords to perform better than competitors in a search engine – you know, have your website at the top of a search engine list.

Most notably, Google is a primary search engine and for this reason it is important to understands what keywords people are actively searching on Google to land on your business website. However, search engines like Google have their limitations and regulations. If you aren’t aware of these so-called rules that are continuously changing, the less likely your business website is to show up in a search result.

You have probably received calls from Google asking you to purchase Ad space. Although you will receive a boost in viewership, it is important to remember that you are doling out cash to appear higher than other websites and will have to continue to dole out cash to remain in that spot, or significantly more cash to appear higher.

I recommend starting off organically. What does that mean?

Organically, refers to originality; showing off your brand’s uniqueness; because even though two businesses can sell grocery products, there’s something “different” about your product, service, etc.

CC Communications uses the word “organically” often. We recommend researching keywords that pertain to your sector of business and utilizing them in a strategic manner to receive higher views. It really is about maintenance and continual management. If you want to maintain your “search engine status” it requires active, consistent, content writing. Your website should have a blog! You should be active on social media! You should ultimately try to #ConnectMORE with your followers and viewers!

We realize people want to be engaged. They do not want to follow an inactive Facebook page or worse for you, one that repeats the content of another provider. People do not want to visit out-dated websites or spend time searching for content regarding your services.

Having multiple social media platforms in additional to a well maintained website are excellent ways to “organically” grow your ranking on a search engine and boost engagement!

However, I understand. Busy business owners don’t have time to perform the research required for their sector of business, let alone the time to write content, manage it, and then strategize. Let CC Communications help!

Book your FREE 30 minute consultation to grow your business’ SEO ranking today! Let’s talk!