Online Marketing Tools for Creative Pros

Ilise Benun

It seems like each month brings another new-fangled online marketing tool — too many, really, and who knows whether they work or will be gone by next year? Are they worth the time and money? It’s hard to know, but here are some pros and cons of the latest relatively inexpensive and easy-to-use options.
Online Networking
You’ve probably heard of MySpace and Facebook, which are social networking Web sites. Business networking is not exactly their purpose. There are, however, social networking sites designed for business.
Of these, LinkedIn is the best known. It’s an online business community of 14 million people (and counting). Maybe you’ve received invitations to join a colleague’s network. Perhaps you’ve even joined (whether or not you recognized the person’s name).
LinkedIn is based on the idea that weak ties tend to be more important than strong ties, a la Six Degrees of Separation. In his best seller, The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell quotes sociologist Mark Granovetter on the strength of weak ties. “Your friends, after all, occupy the same world that you do. They might work with you, or live near you, and go to the same churches, schools, or parties. How much, then, would they know that you wouldn’t know? Your acquaintances, on the other hand, by definition occupy a very different world than you. They are much more likely to know something that you don’t.”
You can use the LinkedIn community to research and make connections with people who know the people you know, who can then become prospects for you with potentially lucrative projects.
Here’s what to do: First, sign up for LinkedIn (it’s free). Then, after a networking event, instead of using regular email to reach out to the people with whom you’ve exchanged business cards, use the LinkedIn invitation feature to do double-duty: Follow up and invite them into your network. This is better because if your new connection accepts your invitation, you both have a more tangible reminder of your connection. Plus, you also have access to their network of contacts.
Another online business community specifically for independent professionals is Biznik. You’ve got to check it out if only for their tagline: Business Networking That Doesn’t Suck.
Biznik bills itself as an online community of independent business people. It started in Seattle but is growing beyond its geographic boundaries. It has more than 5,000 members and, in addition to its online networking features, the site also allows members to host and promote live, in-person, social and educational events. According to Biznik co-founder, Dan McComb, “It’s a great way to build relationships, promote your business, and share your experience.”
Monthly Email Marketing
An email marketing campaign — sending regular email messages to everyone you know and everyone who knows you — is one of the best ways to market your services because it can consistently accomplish many things at once. It can showcase your creativity, increase your visibility and build credibility, while also distinguishing you from the competition. Plus, it’s the best way to drive traffic to your Web site; much more reliable and targeted than the search engines.
What prevents most designers from creating their own email campaign is the time and effort required to generate the content each time. But it doesn’t have to be overwhelming. Once you find a template and a formula that work, treat your campaign like a client project and devote the necessary time. You’ll get faster with each iteration. Here are some ideas for what to send:
Case studies and real-life examples. Your prospects love to see what others like them are doing. That’s why they’ll take time to read a simple case study that describes a problem you solved for a client. Showing how you’ve helped clients address specific challenges is good from a promotional perspective, too, because it gives concrete examples of the work you do, which can otherwise seem abstract.
Your top three to five tips on a subject. Think about what type of hints you can give your clients and prospects about how to make the process of working with you go smoothly. Turn these hints into tips, such as “How to Hire a Designer” or “How to Get Great Work from a Designer.”
Answers to your clients’ frequently asked questions. Keep track of the questions your clients ask, whether via email or in person. Then answer each in a short article. If you can’t think of any questions, send your current clients a quick message asking for their questions.
Your opinion on a hot topic. Don’t be afraid to tackle issues in your field. Offer your own expert opinion — your readers want to know.
You also don’t have to create all the content from scratch. You can pass along links to articles or Web sites that your clients and prospects might find interesting or inspiring.
Since 2002, Lauri Baram of Panarama Design in Clifton Park, NY, has been sending a regular HTML email message, which she calls Panarama Design News and Views, to a growing list of 400+ clients, prospects, and colleagues, all of whom have opted-in — in other words, they want her to keep in touch with them through email and have agreed to receive these messages.
Lauri initiated her email-marketing campaign after returning from the 2002 HOW Design Conference because she wanted to share what she’d learned there with her network. The response was so positive that this single message became a regular mailing.
Finding her content style took a little while. Lauri didn’t want to send marketing advice because half of her network is made up of marketing professionals. And she didn’t want to send design advice because the rest of the list is made up of designers and artists. She did, however, want it to be useful, though not specifically tip-oriented.
What has evolved is an (almost) monthly personal message that doubles as an effective way to reach out to multiple audiences with content of interest to everyone. Each issue is different; taken together, they cover a wide range of topics. In one issue, Lauri wrote about how the film “Frida” inspired her creativity. Another carried the subject line, “Are you working too hard for your own good?” and included an excerpt from a recent book that she had found useful. Another covered the cost of improperly prepared graphic files and offered a checklist of how to avoid prepress problems to save money. The topics are not always directly related to graphic design, but she always manages to tie it back into her business and make a subtle promotional offer along the lines of, “Want me to help you solve this puzzle? Email me.”
Even amidst the email barrage we all deal with, Lauri’s messages have become a must-read for many of her recipients.
Email keeps you visible, keeps your market connected to you, and motivates people to respond. Most important, it is the back and forth that builds relationships. If you do your email marketing right, your recipients will actually look forward to receiving your messages. They may even thank you.
Web Sites and Other Digital Portfolio Options
If you want to be taken seriously as a professional, you really must have a presence online. Ideally, that would be your own Web site at www. yourname.com or www. yourcompanyname.com.
However, if you’re not ready to put the time and money into developing that full-fledged site, you can post samples of your work on one (or more) digital portfolio sites. Here are some of the more popular options:
The Alternative Pick
The Black Book
Creative Hotlist
Folio Planet
Graphic Artists Guild
TheIspot-Showcase
Planetpoint
Portfolios.com
The Workbook
You can use a digital portfolio site as a portal to your own Web site or as your one-and-only online portfolio. If you choose the latter, there will be limitations on how much work you can show and how you show it. On your own Web site, you’re free to organize and display the work in whatever way you think works best.
So how to decide what to do? If possible, you should have both a Web site and your work posted on digital portfolio sites. But the important question to keep in mind when deciding is this: Where do your prospects go when they need to find a designer? Whether they look offline or online depends on what they’re used to and what is convenient at the moment.
They may go to “the books,” those familiar but oh-so-heavy directories of creative resources, or to their own personal address books. The organized ones may check those paper files where they’ve been stuffing promo materials for years. The busy ones may simply ruffle through their most recent pile of mail. The resourceful ones might pick up the phone to call someone who knows a lot of people. But most will go online.
Where will they begin their search? They may start online with the familiar, but perhaps not most effective, search engines, like Google or Yahoo. Or they may start offline then go online to look for more samples on a Web site. The reality is probably that they will use a combination of search tools, online and offline, to get the help they need. That’s why it makes sense to have both a Web site and your digital portfolio posted in a couple different places.
When it comes to searching, fewer options can be a blessing. In fact, one of the reasons buyers go to the portfolio sites is because there is already a filter in place to screen out the irrelevant (and overwhelming) results that are usually accessed through the major search engines.
So one advantage of posting your digital portfolio on portfolio sites is that these sites can drive prospects directly to you, including buyers who probably wouldn’t otherwise find you — which can only add to your own self-promotion efforts.
Blogs
Should you have a blog? That’s the question these days. The answer: It depends.
First, let’s define our terms. According to Wikipedia, “A blog is a user-generated Web site where entries are made in journal style and displayed in a reverse chronological order. Blogs provide commentary or news on a particular subject… A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs, Web pages, and other media related to its topic. The ability for readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important part of most early blogs. Most blogs are primarily textual although some focus on photographs, (photoblog), sketchblog, videos (vlog) or audio (podcasting) and are part of a wider network of social media.”
If you don’t yet have a Web site, a blog is another option. A blog literally takes 10 minutes to create and you don’t need any technical expertise. However, as with the portfolio sites, you have less freedom with the layout due to the limitations of most blog publishing software, especially the free ones. (For a how-to, see “Putting Your Best Blog Forward.”)
If you already have a Web site and are trying to decide between an email newsletter and a blog, note the main difference: A blog is a “pull” (i.e., readers have to find it and go there), while an email marketing message or newsletter is a “push” (i.e., you send it to those you want to keep in touch with). These two tools can also work together beautifully. You can drive traffic to your blog by including links to it in your email messages.
Here’s another difference: “Blogs are conversations, not ads.” So says Colleen Wainwright, a.k.a. The Communicatrix, a designer who blogs. “Blogs are less promotional and less formal than a traditional static Web site,” Colleen says, “so you can speak in your ‘everyday’ voice, which is often more friendly and approachable. Also, you can combine personal and professional elements in your blog; how much depends on what you’re comfortable with, and what your prospective clientele will be comfortable reading about you.”
Also, a blog benefits from visuals, so designers are perfectly positioned to show their style. A small description, a bit of info or counterpoint to the image, and you’re done. That’s the strategy behind Tina Roth Eisenberg’s blog, swissmiss. Tina posts eclectic links and images that demonstrate her personal aesthetic in all sorts of design: industrial design, furniture, graphic design, and more. She also doesn’t hesitate to write somewhat personal posts about her life, about things that make her smile, and other discoveries she makes.
Tina posts every day, sometimes several times a day, spending about an hour each day. Her blog gets an impressive 150,000 to 200,000 visitors per month. “People seem to appreciate the variety I offer,” she says. “My blog posts clearly showcase my aesthetics and prove that I am out there, try to be on top of what’s going on in the design and online world. Maybe visitors sense that and appreciate the honesty and personal touch behind it.”
But is a blog an effective marketing tool?
It can be, but it’s indirect. You shouldn’t expect to “get work” from your blog, although it does happen. In fact, Colleen was approached by a prospect who initially read her writing on The Marketing Mix blog, followed a link to the site where she promotes her design services, and very quickly hired her to design a logo and Web site for his new business. (Full disclosure: The MarketingMix is my blog, and I’m the founder of Marketing Mentor.)
Tina says her blog is her best self-promotional tool, though that was not her intention when she started it. Thanks to her blog she has received RFPs and been interviewed by magazines and other blog writers. “A blog is an amazing way to start a professional relationship. From there, they look up my graphic design portfolio and see the opportunity to collaborate. I’ve even had a few situations where I meet someone, hand them my card and they look at me in disbelief and say, ‘You are Swiss Miss?'”
More than a traditional Web site, a blog has the potential to convey your design sensibility and who you are as a person. Tina’s advice: “Keep it real. Don’t blog just to simply promote your services, or even worse, to cash in on advertising money. Readers will sense it right away if you sell out. Be passionate about your blog. Be consistent. Kept it fresh.”
Paid Search (or Pay Per Click)
You know those little text ads and sponsored links that appear on the right side of a search-engine results page? That’s pay per click, sometimes known as “paid search.” And those ads are different every time someone searches. In fact, the specific ads are chosen (or “served”) based on their connection to the search terms used.
Here’s how paid search generally works: You first determine an amount of money that you’re willing to pay each time a person clicks on your link for a specific keyword. For example, you may bid 25 cents on the term “graphic design.” Every time someone enters that phrase during a search, your site may come up in the results, and if the user clicks on the link, you’re charged 25 cents. If another company bidding on the same term is willing to spend more per click, their site shows up higher on the page of search results than your site does. You can adjust your bid on that term to come up higher in the results. Of course, the other company can do the same. That’s one downside to pay-per-click: the time it takes to evaluate your ad placement.
Dozens of services offer a paid search model, but it’s best to start with one of the big guys, such as Google Adwords, the easiest, most user-friendly service, as well as the quickest. They’ll walk you through the process of setting up your first campaign and choosing your keywords. There are even people you can speak to live if you need help on your first campaign.
However, paid search is effective only when your keywords or keyword phrases are very specific. If you choose a general term, such as “graphic design,” you’ll pay for a lot of clicks that don’t ever convert into actual prospects, much less paying clients. Whereas, if you use targeted keywords, such as “annual report design, Monmouth NJ” you’ll get fewer hits but a much better quality of prospect and it will cost you a lot less.
Give It a Try
Now that you know some of the pros and cons of these new-fangled online marketing tools, you’re better equipped to get the most out of them. So try them out and watch your business grow.