Online marketing: newsletter, Google, Facebook, Instagram and analytics

Let’s get this out of the way right away: The topic of online marketing can easily fill an entire degree course if you really want to do it professionally. We’ll give you a few insights here and show you what you can get out of your customer data.

Google Analytics

The most important thing in effective online marketing is reliable measurement of results. Because measuring is about believing. That’s why we took the trouble to set up Google Analytics for our website. At the same time, we launched a trainee campaign (small tattoos for €50, newsletter to our customers, advertisements on FB&Insta, each with a link to our website including online booking), which generated a lot of demand. With around 100 visitors per day to our website, we already had a pretty good analysis after a short time. The result surprised us:

Direct visits to our website are in first place with 37.3%. This is followed by our newsletter (comparable to our kisscal infoletter).

In second place with 28.6% are the website visitors who find us via the classic Google search, without Google search ads!

These two channels account for 2/3 of our online visitors! Only then come the SM channels Insta and Facebook with 23.2 % (just under 1/4). It’s also interesting to see that paid search ads on Google only account for 2.6% of our visitors. However, we only use these Google search ads for very specific niches.

If I, as a studio or artist, only have a FB or Insta account and no website of my own, then such an evaluation certainly looks different. However, I am then doing without two obviously very strong channels that are also free. The argument that FB and Insta are also free is not really true. If you don’t want to get lost in the mass of increasingly professional profiles, you have to invest a lot of time and money.

Using your own customer data

There is an increasing belief in the industry that followers on FB or Insta are the same as your own customers. And if you post something on FB and/or Insta, you reach all your customers. Unfortunately, this is not correct. For two reasons:

Visibility only at 2-4 %

Due to the new FB/Insta algorithm (from 2016), only around 2-4% of followers see a post that you post. The number of followers you have (> 10,000) and the frequency with which you post something (daily!) play a role here. But also the interaction of users with your own posts: The more popular a post is, the more often other posts from this user will be displayed. This requires correspondingly good or professional images and therefore a lot of work or money.

Followers are not always customers

Followers on FB or Insta are not necessarily potential customers. Especially if I push my number of followers through campaigns (“Follow! Like! Share! Win!”). On the one hand, this is almost necessary, as accounts with few followers are often not even looked at. On the other hand, this brings in many bargain hunters as followers, who only become active during competitions.

The second “problem” arises with followers through pushed posts. Unfortunately, FB/Insta not only distributes them to the desired target group, but also to accounts that like to like them frequently. This makes the result of SM campaigns look better, but in turn brings followers who are not customers.

Incidentally, these two approaches to extending the range also cost money.

The GDPR helps you to use your own customer data

The target group with the greatest willingness to buy are undoubtedly those who have already had a tattoo or piercing with you. And this is exactly where the new GDPR. According to Art. 6 para. 1 letter f) and para. 4 letter b), you may inform your customers about comparable products and offers, even without explicit separate consent (Attention! Corresponding data protection agreement required).

And our experience is: If you don’t spam your customers, but really only inform them about interesting topics and offers, such newsletters are also gratefully accepted and even shared. Your visibility here is a good 30-60%!

Newsletter programs

You should therefore not forget two things in your online marketing: Your customer data (incl. email address) and a newsletter program. Some of these are even free of charge. The aim of your newsletter should always be to bring customers to your website, where they have further information about you, your work and your offers directly at their fingertips. Short paths is the keyword here.

Customer data is hard cash

Of course, this only works if you have customer data in the appropriate electronic form (minimum name and email address). I would like to remind you of our article “Customer data – what for?”.

We therefore strongly recommend:

• Always have your own customer base in addition to your appointments!
• Maintain at least first name, last name (for differentiation), cell phone and email address for your customers!
• Further information about the customer (last appointment, no-show/blocked, …) is also helpful.

Your own website

As mentioned above, having your own website has many advantages, especially if you are a studio with several artists. The most important thing, however, is that you can design your contact form according to your own wishes(ask for specific tattoo requests), offer online appointments and vouchers directly and, above all, with every contact you receive exactly the contact details you want (email, cell phone number, date of birth, etc.). You can even offer a chat channel. And if your website is consistently responsive, your customers can use it like your own studio app.

You can find out more about this topic in our last article “Your website as a Studio app”.

Google – The No. 1 search engine

A few thousand views per month on FB/Insta is already great, but if we hold the view number of our own profile Into The Light on Google next to it (30-40 thousand per month), it quickly becomes clear how important Google is compared to SM channels in online marketing: It’s also the number 1 search engine for tattoos and piercings, and that doesn’t even have to cost money.

We were surprised ourselves that we have significantly more visitors to our website through organic search than through paid search ads. However, this confirms what is repeatedly emphasized in many marketing blogs: The position in Google search among the ads counts.

Consistent SEO optimization of your own website is essential for this. Before many people roll their eyes and turn away: there are very good tools for this and Google itself also offers a good instrument for keyword optimization. However, a good web designer will normally take care of all the details for you.

Google My Business – simple and effective

In our article “Getting appointments in at short notice”, we already mentioned this small but excellent service from Google. You can design how your business is displayed in Google searches, post articles and images, offer products and services and even integrate your online appointment booking. Google My Business is therefore the direct route from Google search to your (virtual) studio.

Search/display displays

As mentioned above, search and display ads in Google are not our first choice, as organic searches still produce significantly better results than purchased searches. We therefore do not use them now. In addition, display ads do not always appear in the desired context: Who wants to place their tattoo ad after a sauerkraut casserole on chefkoch.de? Sure, you can place (almost) anything here, but as I said, you need to have studied the topic.

More?

Do you have any further questions about online marketing? Are you interested in specific channels or tools? Write to us and we will be happy to address your questions in our next Infoletters.