Why G Suite Is A Must-Have for Small Businesses

Why G Suite Is A Must-Have for Small Businesses

Why G Suite Is A Must-Have for Small Businesses

Written by: Ian Chandler, Freelance Writer and Marketing Expert

Many of Google’s tools are invaluable for small business owners. Google My Business is especially useful, but perhaps the most popular Google tool is G Suite. G Suite is virtually a household name in the business world. Even if you don’t use the full G Suite, you probably already use Gmail, Google Docs, or one of the many services included in the full suite. But if you’re not already using the entire G Suite, you absolutely need to consider it.

In this article, you’ll learn all about what G Suite is, how to get started with it, and how it can help your small business.

What is G Suite?

Simply put, G Suite is Google’s collection of collaboration and productivity tools. Google breaks up the suite into four main sections that each have different programs associated with them:

  • Connect: Gmail, Calendar, Google+, Hangouts Chat, Hangouts Meet
  • Create: Docs, Sheets, Forms, Slides, Sites, App Maker, Keep, Jamboard
  • Access: Drive, Cloud Search
  • Control: Admin, Vault, Mobile

You can read more about each tool on the official G Suite page. But for now, all you need to know is that G Suite encompasses a range of programs that help you run your business better.

It doesn’t stop there, either––there are business-specific benefits that G Suite provides. You’ll get the ability to send email from your business web address, so you’ll be able to email from hello@yourcompany.com instead of using yourcompany@gmail.com. It sounds like a minor change, but it can help you show your audience that you’re a professional team, not just someone doing this as a side project. You’ll also get a whopping 30GB of cloud storage, 24/7 live support, advanced admin controls, mobile device management, and easy data migration.

How Does G Suite Improve My Business?

Enough about the tech specs. Here are 3 concrete ways G Suite can help you enhance your day-to-day operations.

G Suite simplifies and optimizes your workflow

Think about your current business workflow. What does your typical day consist of? If you’re like most small business owners, you likely spend a lot of your time emailing, communicating with your team, scheduling, and maybe even performing some more involved tasks like making spreadsheets or managing data.

One of the central benefits of G Suite is that it organizes all of those tasks into one unified framework. This can help you build a seamless workflow where everything works perfectly with everything else, and you can access it from any computer that has Internet access.

If you’re using tools from a bunch of different brands, you know how much friction there can be when trying to move between tools. With G Suite, everything is designed to cooperate. That means you can easily share files, transfer data, and involve your team across the board.

Collaborate better with G Suite

Speaking of involving your team, let’s talk about how great collaboration is with G Suite. Many existing collaboration and productivity solutions are standalone, so you can easily find yourself using several websites that don’t work together.
Since G Suite connects everything, collaboration is a breeze. For example, you can tag someone in a Google Doc and have a conversation about it on Hangouts. Google Drive is arguably the best collaborative feature––it helps you manage all of your miscellaneous documents using one interface. You can quickly create handy folders, and you can even decide who can see what, making team management incredibly easy.

G Suite doesn’t require you to be insanely tech-savvy

G Suite is all about removing pain points and making things easy. That means you don’t have to be a tech whiz to use it. The highly visual interfaces are simple to browse and get used to, and file management is straightforward. No matter your level of experience, you can use G Suite to improve your business and create a better workflow. If you can send an email, you can use G Suite.

Even though it’s simple, G Suite can help you look more like a professional and less like a hobbyist. If you’re looking to take your small business to the next level, then you owe it to yourself to see what G Suite can do for you.

Sign up with this link https://goo.gl/KYBSm8 to get a free 14-day trial, and message me to get an exclusive discount when you try G Suite for your business.

We can do it for you

Give us a call to start a free trial to see what G Suite can do for you, your productivity, and your business. We’ll get everything set up for you, so you can stay focused on building your brand.
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Our Top 5 Social Media Automation Tools

Our Top 5 Social Media Automation Tools

Our Top 5 Social Media Automation Tools

Written by Emma Sloan, Social Media Manager and Content Writer

As a business owner, a strong online presence is essential to both sales and growth, right? But, as a business owner, there are about a million and one things that take priority over scheduling social media posts? Also right.

Well, we’ve been there, so we’re here to outline five of our favourite social media automation tools in 2019. Whether you’re a veteran digital marketer, just starting out, or a business owner at their wits end with online engagement, we promise that at least one of our favourites will strike a chord in you.

Why should you automate your social media?

For most small businesses, finding the time to do everything is a challenge. By setting up an automation system, you can drastically reduce the amount of time needed to share valuable content, giving you more time to create meaningful connections with the people interested in your services.

What many T2GO clients do is spend an hour once or twice a month, curating content that fits the message they want to deliver through their social media channels. They schedule the posts via their favourite automation tool and then get on with their business. They don’t need to spend any time in social media unless they get a message request from a prospect or client. It’s an efficient way to deliver great content without spending a ton of time or money.

If you have questions about curating content or configuring your automation tools, contact us – we’ll help you find the right answers for your specific situation.

#5: SocialOomph

Promising to “boost your social media productivity”, SocialOomph is a Canadian company that has been in the social media automation business since 2008. Originally focused solely on Twitter, SocialOomph has expanded its scope to encompass Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Plurk, blog posts, and RSS social updates.

Hailed as versatile, easy to manage, and fair-priced (offering a free 7-day trial and under $20 CAD bi-weekly), SocialOomph is perfect for companies with multiple pages looking to get the ultimate bang for their buck.

#4: IFTTT

IFTTT: free and customizable, If This Then That (IFTTT) is an app that focuses on meaningful audience engagement. Orbiting around veteran techies, IFTTT gives people who are already well-versed with social media to link accounts for maximum engagement and reach. Want your Twitter to send out a post every time you post to Instagram? IFTTT has got you covered—and yes, it’s all free!

There are a ton of possibilities with IFTTT – if there’s a digital trigger (whether that’s hitting your daily step goal or an email from your favourite client) you can set up an action with IFTTT. Check out this article for 9 great IFTTT recipes.

#3: Hootsuite

Tailored to entrepreneurs and small business owners, Hootsuite (another Canadian start-up) helps users engage with audiences, schedule content, and track insights all at the click of a button.

Offering up to 10 social profiles per solo account, unlimited RSS integrations, a $500 monthly boost spending limit, and in-dash live support, Hootsuite offers four plans (Professional, Team, Business, and Enterprise) for maximum budget and account preference flexibility—perfect for businesses with a focus on visual content and analytics reporting. Plus, try it free for an entire month!

#2: SproutSocial

With an astronomically high user rating, accessibility, and unique option to uncover digital marketing trends via Sprout Social’s brand analysis, competitive insights, and industry intelligence, the automation service Sprout Social truly does the heavy lifting for you. By offering their myriad of in-depth demos, blogs, solutions based on business type, and recommendations based on both social platform and need, it’s clear to see why Sprout Social comes so highly recommended.

#1: Buffer

An automation program built for both mobile and PC usage, Buffer is used by over 80,000 businesses worldwide. By offering all of your social platforms in one place using an easy-to-use toggle feature, a straightforward scheduling calendar, analytics, and the option to set the access levels for each and every one of your team members, Buffer is fantastic for entrepreneurs because of its Free feature: the opportunity to have three social media accounts and 10 posts per month on any social media platform for free.

Let us take care of it for you

You can automate your social media presence yourself, or you can call us to take care of everything for you. We can create fresh content, engage your audience, and help you improve your online presence through all of your channels – email marketing, social media, and your own website.

 

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The Best Email Marketing Tools for 2019

The Best Email Marketing Tools for 2019

Building Your Brand Through Email Marketing

Written by Emma Sloan, Social Media Manager and Content Writer

Email marketing tools are one of the best investments to make if you’re even remotely interested in email marketing for your business. But which tools should you be using, and how can you optimize lead generation for emails? We’ve listed below our favourite email marketing tool recommendations for 2019—as well as our go-to tips for sending emails that turn into new business.

Our Top 3 Tools for Email Marketing

MailChimp

Email marketing doesn’t just end in your inbox—good email marketing will convert readers into customers, which is exactly what MailChimp does. Beginner-friendly, affordable for marketers of all sizes, and easily connectable to WordPress websites and eCommerce stores, MailChimp thrives by being the best of the best at customer conversion to not only retain your clients, but grow your customer base overall. Its ability to create gorgeous landing pages— which is absolutely essential, due to how many clients are gained via visuals—  and its free plan makes it a fantastic resource for companies both small and large.

SendInBlue

An email and SMS marketing software striving for simplicity, SendInBlue is a marketing tool that offers easy-to-navigate marketing campaigns, transactional messages to customers, and a flexible budget: their free account comes with unlimited contacts and a limit of 9000 emails per month, and their SMS credits can be bought separately with no expiry.

ConstantContact

Hailed as the #1 most-popular email marketing service for small business, ConstantContact’s high ranking is due to its myriad of customizable email templates, the ability to select how much experience in email marketing you possess, and promotion ideas based on your industry. On top of their 14 or 30-day trials in which people are given full access to their tools, their live chat, email help line, and discussion forums offer unparalleled customer service.

We’re a ConstantContact all star, but we can help you on any platform.

Converting emails into new business

91% of businesses use email marketing to create demand for their services. You’ve likely seen many different ways to do this – from cold email campaigns to regular newsletters – and no matter which model you choose, we recommend you stick to these five simple steps:

  1. A permission-based email list. Crafting a list of email contacts that you intend to market to—all the while offering the option to unsubscribe to avoid negative customer response— can stem from a combination of your professional and personal social circles. Narrowing your contact list down to persons of interest (as in, those who have either a direct or indirect interest in your core services) helps to both focus and optimize your reach. DO NOT PURCHASE AN EMAIL LIST (we’ll go into this in a future post, but just don’t – it’s not worth the time, money, or possibility of severe negative blowback)
  2. A strong subject header. We all receive too many emails, and how many non-business ones do we gloss over? Probably most of them, which makes the importance of a short, strong, engaging subject line all the more emphasized. Think of the subject line as a teaser for the email – get them in the right frame of mind to read your message.
  3. Personalization and curiosity are essential: hook your reader in the first second and let them know that the content relates to them. The payoff needs to be clear from the title of the email onwards. If you received this email and wouldn’t feel incentivized to read it, then you know it’s time to rewrite.
  4. Have a persuasive CTA. A call-to-action is what converts leads into clients; direct them to sign up for your services, phone your team to learn more, or schedule an in-person consultation to continue the conversation. And through the tracking features on your email marketing tool, the clicks show you who is interested in your services, so you can follow-up with them with more emails, a phone call, or an in-person visit, depending on your business model.
  5. Scarcity and Demand are always good motivators. People want what’s cheap or hard to find, and we love the feeling that comes from getting a deal before the deadline. Create a sense of urgency in your email by offering a limited time offer – and this doesn’t have to be a discount. People prefer higher value over lower costs, so choose promotions that offer more value instead of slashing the price. We do this by offering the first three months of hosting with any web package. Choose a service that you are comfortable giving away, and use that as an add-on, and watch your sales increase.

Contact us to set up your email marketing

We can help you build your email list through effective leadgen campaigns, PPC marketing, social media marketing, and creative, quality content. And once you have a list, we can help you stay in touch with your customers, earning referrals, repeat business, and new opportunities.

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How Google My Business Can Help Your Business Thrive Online and Offline

How Google My Business Can Help Your Business Thrive Online and Offline

Google My Business 101

Written by Emma Sloan, Social Media Manager and Content Writer

So, you’re either just getting started with SEO or are looking for a way to focus your digital

marketing efforts. Well, you’re in the right place: keep reading for a clear, concise, one-stop overview of what Google My Business is, how to best set it up, and a few examples of businesses using it right.

What is GMB?

To start, Google My Business is a free resource that allows you to manage how your business appears on both Google Search and Google Maps. The tool gives business owners and digital marketers the ability to:

  • add the business name, location, and hours
  • create photo galleries of your products/services/team
  • view and respond to customer reviews
  • learn how and where your audience is searching for you.

Why are those functions—especially location-oriented functions— important for your business? Well, it’s been statistically proven that one in two people who search Google locally (as in, people who search “Plumbers near me” or “Repairmen in my city”) visit a business that very same day, meaning it’s vital to gaining and retaining your customer base that the information about your business is as visible, accurate, and complete as possible.

How Do I Set Up GMB?

Setting up GMB is a fast four-step process: Create & Claim, Verify, Optimize, and Download.

Start by logging into the Google account you want affiliated with your business, or create a new one specifically for the role; go to this page and select the “Start Now” option in the top right corner; enter your business’s name, location, delivery locations (if applicable), and verify.

How do you verify your business for GMB? Well, depending on the type of business you have, you may have five options to verify your business: postcard verification, phone verification, email verification, instant verification, and bulk verification.

Next, be sure to flesh out your business profile to ensure maximum optimization. As a potential customer, what information would you want to be easily accessible when looking up a business? The answers are the usual suspects: a biography, website link, location, hours, attributes (such as “Wheelchair accessible”), your opening date, and photo gallery. Google recommends that all of these sections be completed and to have a minimum of three photos—with the recommendation that they either consist of the exterior and interior of your business, your employees at work, one or more product shots, or services—for the best optimization. Along with a good website, a good GMB page is key to seeing your business thrive.

Download the GMB app for iOS or Android so you can stay connected with your customers in real-time.

Examples of GMB Optimization

Seeking some visual examples to model your own GMB account? I completely understand—which is why we’ve detailed three to help you get started.

Yes, the grocery giant itself: Walmart. Why does their page work? Simple— all of their locations are tagged, their photo gallery is both immense and varied, and their web results are linked for easy information finding.
Never underestimate a strong biography. Peoples’ reads: “For over 100 years, Peoples has provided an accessible and comfortable shopping experience for its Canadian customers. With its strong assortment of affordable fine jewellery and brand-name watches, Peoples Jewellers provides selections for every occasion and every customer.” Its strength lies in being short, snappy, and, most importantly, clear. It ensnares customers’ attention and gives them their required information in under one minute.
All sections completed? Check. Physical and delivery locations defined? Check. An active response to Google reviews and clear, accessible links? Check, check, and check.

The more complete your information is, the more likely it is that the potential customer will come to you, so stay ahead of the competition with a fantastic GMB page.

Call us to set up your Google My Business page

Time2GetOnline.com is a Canadian business offering affordable websites, managed WordPress hosting, and marketing assistance to small businesses locally and globally. Contact us to connect with your customers online.

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