As a digital marketing professional, you’ve likely received a host of cold calls and emails during your career about hundreds of digital marketing tools that will “forever change the way you do marketing.” While that can’t be true of all of them, there are some digital marketing tools that are worth paying for.

The New Year is slipping away, and we are about to jump into Q2. It is always helpful to take an introspective moment to understand why we're operating the way we are, but making sure your reaching for the right goals is something to re-visit before too much of the year passes. Lots of buzz starts early, picking up steam in mid to late December and exploding onto the scene in January. But like most ambitious, life-changing endeavors, the efforts are short-lived if we don't check-in and hold ourselves accountable. 

As an agency ourselves, we’re the first to understand that picking a marketing agency to help your business is a massive decision, from the finances, to trusting someone to love your baby as much as you do. There are tons of marketing firms out there, some bad, some good, some great but maybe not a great fit for you. Finding the agency that’s right for you is a little like dating, to be honest.

When you first meet someone, you’re curious about their history, their habits, and their goals. And, as we have confirmed in the 10 years of agency success, there are a few facts that will reveal to you if this person in front of you will be a good partner or not. So, let’s take a look at the three major questions you need to ask when courting your marketing agency.

Knowing the difference in an MQL (Marketing Qualified Lead) and an SQL (Sales Qualified Lead) is as key to your business’ success as a business plan. It means you’ve got a buyer’s journey mapped up and have streamlined what the buying process look like for your customer. But what if you’ve never heard of an MQL versus an SQL? Hey, you can’t know what you don’t know. But have no fear, because today we’re defining the difference, breaking down the stages, and determining when the transition from one to the other takes place.

Terms like “The Sales Funnel” always sound more vague and complicated than they truly are. While it may sound like something only a well-seasoned marketer would know what to do with, it’s really just industry speak for the sales process. The term “sales funnel” is helpful because the visual is accurate to how you cast your net when it comes to converting leads to paying customers. 

Whether you’re Eliud Kipchoge, sprinting out a 2:01:39 marathon time (that’s 4:38 a mile, y'all), a procrastinator ready for change, or a business owner trying to increase foot traffic, it’s important to have measurable goals. No matter who you are or what your goal, it’s much better aimed at when it’s got some measurement backing it up. Today we’re taking a look at why you need to set measurable goals and exactly how to do just that.

Marketing automation is a powerful business tool. If used correctly, marketing automation can help you achieve continued business growth for your KPIs while saving tens or hundreds of hours - who doesn't want that!? However, adopting and applying these automation tools to scale the marketing efforts in your business becomes a complex and sometimes risky task.

It's time to bring clarity to marketing automation to help you decide if, and to what degree, that these tools should be used, and how to apply marketing automation to scale your business.

Technology is an amazing thing.

Previously, if you wanted website content, you had to hire a great writer, which could involve a lot of time, energy, and frustration.

Now, technology has blessed us with several online services that serve as a hub to connect businesses in need of content with content writers.

These online services not only connect these two parties but have greatly increased competition for content writers. From bidding systems to ranking systems, any unknown writer across the globe can have the ability to challenge the price or quality of a piece of work to that of a popular or famous writer.

Here are the 4 websites that can help you create website content.

Are you struggling with writing content? You're not alone. Content writers give you the ability to bypass some of the common struggles that most all of us face. Here are serveral reasons you should be working with a content writer.

If you're finding it hard to see how this content will actually translate into growing your business, I'd suggest first taking a look at these Cold, Hard Stats About Marketing and Content. 

When you’re looking at developing a new website there are a lot of options available. You may ask yourself, “Should I try and do it myself, hire a freelancer, or should I call my friend’s brother he keeps mentioning?” These ideas are not necessarily bad, but for many businesses they aren’t the best choice.