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April 11, 2020

10 Free Tools To Help You Work From Home

Slowly coming to terms with the changes forced upon us by the spread of COVID-19? It is difficult, shifting work to your home premises. But it is not impossible.

Here is a list of some free tools that can make the transition to working from home smoother and hassle-free.

Slack – It is a great collaboration hub that allows you to share files and communicate in groups as well as on a one-on-one basis.

Google Hangouts –It brings to life conversations through texts, audio and video connections on a one-on-one basis and for groups.

Zoom–It is a platform that allows you to hold video meetings and host virtual presentations online. It offers real time chats and video recording features as well.

Skype–It is a free communications tool that helps you connect with as many as 50 people through audio or video conferencing.

AirTable–This is a strong tool that helps manage data and inventory on visually appealing spreadsheets so you can keep track of what your team is doing.

Asana –It helps teams structure work and tasks and helps team leaders and team members track progress and completion of tasks.

GitHub–It is a crucial free tool used to facilitate design and development, used as it is for version control and viewing, sharing and collaborating on code developed by team members.

Chrome DevTools–It is used for web development and the software is built directly into the Google Chrome browser.

Grammarly– It is a great platform used for writing on and editing documents with.

Google Drive– It is best for sharing files and collaborating on them with remote team members.

Try these tools out, according to your needs and preferences. For more on the subject, check out our previous blog here – www.sproutroad.com/how-you-can-work-from-home-during-covid-19-some-free-tools.

Tips to Increase Your E-Commerce Sales

Have an online store and wondering how to boost sales in times like these? Every online store must be thinking on the same lines, actually.

It can be especially challenging to put in place effective business strategies when the spread of the deadly COVID-19 virus has affected economies the world over.

That is why we have put together this article to help you understand some ways whereby you can increase online sales. Read on to know more.

Email Marketing

While you must be engrossed in putting money into paid marketing strategies on the Internet, a less expensive and more profitable exercise is automated email marketing.

It allows you to directly communicate with a customer and send him or her relevant and timely messages, especially if you want to upsell a product.

Upsell a Product

Upsells refer to selling or showcasing a product of higher value and better quality to a buyer who has opted to buy a certain product.

For instance, if you are looking to buy a phone online and your online store advertises or pushes for a higher-grade model of the same series and the same company, it amounts to upselling a product.

That way, you might end up selling a more expensive product to a customer.

Showcase product benefits

Since all you have to showcase a product is photographs, ensure these are professionally clicked against a clear backdrop, preferably white. Ensure the lighting is right and the camera quality good.

Also, polish up your product descriptions and add as many details regarding dimensions, colour and terms of use and your return policy.

Customer Testimonials

Mandatorily ask for user testimonials on the checkout page of you platform so you have an arsenal of feedback that you can use to your benefit.

Be a proud seller and showcase these customer testimonials to prospective buyers. These testimonials can feature anywhere on your web site – on landing pages, on the product page or on the home page.

Manufacture Urgency

There is no harm in creating a sense of urgency around your product sale. It gives the buyer incentive and a time frame to buy you product in.

And do not forget to follow up sales with an after-sale email that is a thoughtful way of building a relationship with your customer.

There are more technical ways to boost sales as well (take optimising your website pages or getting more Ad Clicks with Ad Extensions). But this article sheds light on some of the humbler points to remember while strategizing for an increase in sales that often get overlooked. Hope this helped. Best, Sprout Road

To get an e-commerce website or to setup avenues for your business, get in touch with us here.

March 31, 2020

How You Can Work From Home During COVID 19 – Some Free Tools

Working from home? So are we. And so are millions of people across the world forced indoors by the spread of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic.

But if you have access to the Internet, you are doing better than many because of a variety of free tools available to assist you in working from home.

For communicating

There are several free tools available for helping you to communicate with your colleagues.

Tools like Slack, Workplace by Facebook, Basecamp, Discord and Microsoft Teamsare the names you should be acquainted with.

Most of these are on offer with paid plans, but they grant basic free packages with some limitations (that should not pose any problems to users).

For instance, there is a guide to Slack’s free versus paid-for services.

For work lists and projects management

Making a to-do list of tasks is the foremost way of keeping track of work to be done and tasks completed.

There are several tools which help carry out this function. Take, for instance, Trello and Google Keep.

Tools like Trello give us the opportunity to handle projects, keep a track of work done, add comments or collaborate on these.

Google Keep allows us to do similar things like making lists, taking notes (with a feature that allows for attaching pictures or audio clips), and sharing them with co-workers.

Apps like Zoho, Asana and Paymo can also be used for these functions.

For Collaboration

To collaborate on documents, worksheets and presentations, the most widely used tools are those comprised in the Google Suite.

Google Docs, Google Sheets, and Google Slides facilitate work on documents, worksheets or spreadsheets and presentations respectively.

Files are usually saved on Google’s cloud platform – Google Drive – though they can also be saved in the offline mode. An alternative is Zoho Docs.

Conclusion

Working from home can be productive if you want it to be. So do not hesitate to be adaptive. We suggest you try out these free tools and recommend them to colleagues as well. And if you are looking for more suggestions, do read our upcoming blog. Best, Sprout Road

March 19, 2020

Four Reasons Why We Need To Do SEO in Times of COVID-19

You are probably reading this from your computer system at home, with most private and government institutions declaring work-from-home arrangements to be made in the wake of the deadly coronavirus pandemic. As of Thursday, March 19, the COVID-19 has affected over 220,000 people and caused the death of over 8,800 persons across the globe.

As a result of the pandemic, countries have suspended flights into their respective geographies and asked citizens to self-isolate in case they fall ill. Trade has been affected and businesses hit. In such times, it is best not to panic and instead think up ways to brace against the emergency upon all of us.

Keep Calm and Optimize

While it is true that businesses across the spectrum have taken a hit because of coronavirus, it is not wise to withdraw your contract and put a complete stop to marketing operations in what is best termed as a knee-jerk reaction to the crisis. The move will put your business in trouble and force it into an unnecessarily long term struggle to recover.

“Organic search is a zero-sum game” – your gains or losses are balanced by the gain or losses of other companies listed on SERPs (Search-engine Results Pages). People might not be actively seeking to pay for as many products or services as they used to earlier, but they are certainly searching them online and it is best you be visible and up and running in the market to give a sense of normalcy than be off it.

Budgeting for Marketing & SEO

Around 7% to 8% of your gross revenue is the bare minimum you should spend on marketing and SEO activities, even in times of an epidemic like coronavirus. People are making purchases, despite the lockdown and you do not want to stay behind in terms of paid advertisements, especially on the internet.

If you cannot, however, afford it (because of employees staying back home or a slashing down of business operations), then cut on paid advertisement. But do not compromise on SEO and inbound marketing, both of which are long term plans. You have taken months to build quality marketing strategies and a loyal customer base. Do not desert them in times of an emergency.

Four reasons why you must continue doing SEO in times of an epidemic

Those businesses that are cash rich are the ones that will survive this downturn. To stay ahead of the game, the best practice is to have a competent SEO strategy in place. And if you choose to go a step forward, you should generate Opt-in Emails for prospective clients. This depends on a robust SEO strategy which ensures customers, who are spending more and more time on their phones and computers because of the lockdown in their respective countries, take note of your products or services on the internet.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM) helps you reach customers with immediate buying intent, something that you would want to achieve in these times of a slowdown which has in all probability forced a budget crunch at your end. Moreover, SEM shows you whether or not your strategy is successful and effective. All you have to do is look up the sales or leads in your analytics. Since buyer behaviors is sure to undergo change in the next few weeks, it will become important for you to concentrate your services and advertisement strategy on the changes in buying patterns.

A scarcity of products has been reported from markets across cities with allegations of consumers hoarding essentials like toilet paper and sanitizer and even food items triggered by the scare caused by the pandemic. In such situations, more and more people are searching the internet for online purchases of essential items or important services. In case they cannot find those, they are searching for alternatives. But searches are going up for sure. So it is best you be visible on the internet in full force.

Even if people are self-isolating, it is only temporary and they will need products and services in the near future. Though things are looking bad currently, the situation is bound to improve in the future and we must be prepared for that and wait for things to get to normal. SEO is the most effective way to market your business in downtimes.

Hope this helped calm you and hope this finds you well. Best, Sprout Road.

October 31, 2019

The Biggest SEO Trends of 2019

2019 has been a crucial year for SEO due to numerous reasons.

With AI, Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality driving the digital marketing landscape, it’s time we take charge before things get a bit overwhelming. As SEO professionals, we need to dominate the SERPs, generate more revenue and stay ahead of the curve.

Here are the top 10 SEO trends to watch out in 2019:

Understand User Intent and Audience

What does your targeted audience like? Texts, images or videos?

Answering this is all the more important this year, according to the experts. You need to understand what your audience is expecting from you and deliver them the solution in the easiest way possible.

Look Beyond Google Search Engine

In 2019, we expect a steady rise of Amazon and Apple search engines. No more would it be enough to optimize Google; you have to take into account other search engines as well. You need to look beyond the websites, optimize for devices and drive engagement to your products, said Cindy Krum, CEO of MobileMoxie.

Use Structured Data As Much As Possible

As AI is becoming the power tool for Google, the use of structured data is rapidly increasing simultaneously. JP Sherman, enterprise search expert at Red Hat shared that you should start comprehending structured data, active and passive search behaviors, and understanding how they adhere to behaviors that depict intent. Establishing contextual relationships between behaviors and topics is the key.

Content Is Still King

2018’s Google algorithm updates revealed that the search engine giant is acutely focusing on churning out high-quality content and rewarding sites that guarantee best in-depth content experiences. Last year, websites that offered incredible depth in quality content soared in page rankings while those that were weaker in content depth suffered.

E-A-T

Establish and enhance your expertise, authority and trustworthiness – collectively known as EAT- according to Google’s search quality rating guidelines.

“Although the E-A-T guidelines are written for Google’s algorithm raters, rather than Google’s algorithm itself, it helps us to understand where Google is heading in the short term,” said Dixon Jones, founder of DHJ Ventures. “I think this will help SEOs start to understand that ‘quality’ comes with context. You cannot rank so easily writing authoritative content unless you are already an authority on a given subject.”

Technical SEO

Day by day, websites are becoming more complex. Investment in technical SEO is now an absolute necessity. Corporate houses, who want to reap maximum benefit has to consider the glorious aspects of technical SEO. Speed, JavaScript and Progressive Web Apps are few technical areas in focus.

Focus on On-page Optimization

On-page SEO tactics continue fetching desirable results. Companies, big and small, are still witnessing incredible results from on-page optimization. It is great for driving traffic and increasing your online search presence.

2019: Year for Voice Search

Voice optimization is the strategy of the year. Last year, we saw the advent of voice search and how it gained immense attention. It is expected to become more popular and important in 2019. Michael Bonfils, MD of SEM International added that voice search is deemed to be a game-changer for multilingual and MNC websites shortly.

Impact of Machine Learning is Likely to Double

Machine learning is being adopted to curate unique content for SEO. AI coupled with data analysis and reporting is now the new imperative to decode failures and successes. Expect layout changes and a swooshing drive to address intents instead of questions.

Optimize for Feature Snippets and Google SERP Features

“Answer boxes, recipes, the knowledge graph, carousels, and who-knows-what-else will take an even bigger bite out of organic traffic,” pointed out Ian Lurie, CEO and founder of Portent. “That makes SEO even more important because exposure is as much about visibility in the SERPs as it is about clicks.”

As end notes, we’ve just scratched the surface till now. For more interesting updates on SEO trends and insights, follow us on Facebook and Instagram.

Category: digital marketing