13 Great Mobile Marketing Tools You Need

Are you annoyed at companies pushing mobile yet? I know I am. We know, we know, it's a mobile-first world. Mobile shopping is expanding rapidly, which means as marketers, we have to keep up. Keeping up doesn't just mean plugging in the CSS to make your landing pages responsive, it also means mobile friendly advertisements, development of mobile apps, and making dashboards accessible from mobile.

But what is most important to mobile users is efficiency and productivity. How fast are the pages loading? Can I access everything I could on a desktop? Is it easy to read or complete a transaction? Below, we curated a list of top apps and tools to help with your mobile marketing plan.

 

Tools for Social Marketing on Mobile

#1. Yelp

As a friend arrogantly declared after moving into the city, “All businesses need Yelp. If you don't have Yelp, I'm not buying your stuff-especially because I'd have nowhere to complain if it's bad.” Tbh, I agree.

Yelp boasts an average of 92 million unique mobile users per month, with 102 million reviews. 72% of total page views and 60% of all content (reviews and photos) come from mobile. That's crazy, but believable. Before I walk into a restaurant I've never been before, I do my research. I find veterinarians on Yelp, painters, even DMVs. You should absolutely be claiming your local business, setting up a page to respond to reviewers, and even consider paying for sponsored advertisements so you aren't missing out on a huge section of potential customers.

#2. Instagram

With more than 300 million daily users and over 95 million photos and videos posted per day, Instagram has an incredibly large reach. Luckily, combined with the power of Facebook ad targeting, you can access that audience in a meaningful way with this marketing tool.

Similar to Facebook advertising, Instagram has a plethora of options. Using Instagram ads, you can increase awareness and message association, drive traffic to your website, or encourage downloads of your mobile applications.

 

#3. Facebook

Facebook has 1.57 billion mobile monthly active users and 56.5% of users only login to the platform from a mobile device. Let's be real-Facebook is far too large to ignore, or else it is the awkward herd of dinosaurs in the room. With the amazing options that Facebook offers for advertising, you are able to market directly to specific users within your target demographics.

Because everything is URL based (if you have the universal tracking pixel) as an advertiser, you are able to target specific pages on mobile. Additionally, marketers can use remarketing on mobile to access users after they have visited your website, used your app, or provided you with their email address.

Okay, so you're already using all Facebook advertising and you want to know how to do it on the go? Try Ads Manager for iOS. This application can track performance, send you push notifications, and allows you to create and edit ads on your iOS device.

Not sure if Facebook ads are right for your business? Figure it out!

 

Tools for Content Marketing on Mobile

#4. WordPress/Medium

If you run a website or blog-or are looking to start one-WordPress and Medium are both great mobile-friendly platforms. In February, WordPress rolled out Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) to improve the load time of pages on tablets and phones on their own site and self-hosted sites. WordPress also has a comprehensive mobile app that will allow you edit existing posts or create new ones from your mobile phone.

Medium, created by some of the guys who created Twitter, is becoming popular for all kinds of bloggers. The site itself and all posted pages are mobile-friendly and Medium also has an app that allows you to read, edit and create posts, and react by responding to others' posts. You can use this platform to repost content that is already on your own site's blog, or create a new post on the go. If you're not totally sure that Medium is right for you, here are some tips from Larry!

#5. SlideShare

The adopted child of LinkedIn, SlideShare is so important to anyone who has presented at a conference or webinar, as well as those who want to reference that presentation. With over 70 million users, 18 million uploads in 40 content categories, SlideShare is the go-to spot to post your knowledge-share. Even better, your posted content won't just sit there unnoticed; 80% of visitors come to the site through specific searches, leading them directly to the type of content they are looking for and giving you exposure.

Not buying it? SlideShare has shareable social buttons, a comment section for questions or compliments, and shows the day the slides were published (which is great to make sure the data is relevant!).

Tools for Mobile Website Management

#6. Google's Mobile-Friendly Testing Tool

Do you remember when Google told us that mobile-responsiveness would affect how your landing pages show up on google search? This isn't breaking news, it has been in effect since 2014, but continues to be relevant in different ways. To help sites analyze usability on mobile, Google introduced a Mobile-Friendly Test and a Mobile usability report. The Mobile-Friendly test is simple:  enter your webpage URL and Google will spit out a basic report saying “Awesome! This page is mobile-friendly!” (or not so much) and a screenshot of how it looks on a mobile device.

The Mobile Usability Report is similar, but more in-depth look at how major mobile issues occur across the entire site, not just one page. Google is also kind enough to provide a guide on how to customize a website for mobile, how to configure SEO for mobile, and warns users about common mistakes.

#7. Google Analytics

If you're not using Google Analytics, you're making a mistake. But that's another conversation. If you are using GA, take advantage of all the mobile opportunities! Not only does the suite allow you to track everything that occurs on mobile, you can track it from your mobile device.

The app helps you check metrics in your customized reports, monitor real-time data, build and save your own reports to the dashboard with any metrics, dimensions, and segments you care about. Google is constantly updating any bugs they discover, but most recently rolled out an update which added support for custom metrics and dimensions, added several default segments, and expanded support to all languages on iOS.

Really, Google Analytics makes miracles happen-I could go on forever about it. Check it out for yourself!

 

#8. Google's PageSpeed Tools

If you haven't heard about Google's Micro-Moments, you should check out their guides! One of their best tips-that all website optimizers and managers will agree with-is to be quick. Consumers expect instant gratification more than ever and the patience they once had with a slow-loading app or mobile site is disappearing. In fact, 70% of website abandonment cites lagging load times as the culprit. That's huge!

Make sure your page is up to snuff with the PageSpeed Tool. It will analyze the content of your site and make suggestions on how it can be improved, such as “optimize images” or “leverage browser caching”. If that's not enough detail, there is a whole guide here!

Tools for Mobile Advertising

#9. AdWords Performance Grader

Last month, our awesome team released new updates for the AdWords Performance Grader, many of which focused on mobile. Because Google has clearly stated a mobile-first philosophy and mobile searches now out-number desktop, the Grader has added cool new features to check how your PPC accounts are measuring up!

The biggest mobile update is a completely revamped section on Mobile Advertising. Though it is available exclusively to WordStream customers, it provides relative CPC for mobile and notes how much an account is spending on mobile compared to industry standards. If you're not a WordStream customer, don't worry. Click-Through Rate and Text Ad Optimization is now analyzed by desktop, tablet, and mobile, and a check has been added to the Best Practices that looks for mobile bid modifiers in ad groups.

#10. Mobile Pay

If you have any friends who are striving for a Starbucks gold card, you probably know how important their Starbucks mobile app and payment is to them. Apple introduced the Wallet on iPhones with iOS 6, which supports mobile payments to a number of vendors: Starbucks, Target, various airlines and hotels, etc. Not an iPhone user or don't use Apple Pay? Users can choose from Google Wallet or Square Wallet or PayPal. These apps are armed with fraud protection and immediate payment alerts.

By eliminating the pain of plugging in credit card info or digging out dollar bills, not only can you have a more efficient business, you'll also have happy customers! This is an easy way to implement a loyalty program as well, all from the comfort of a mobile device. Best of all, these apps will show your business as a shopping option when someone downloads the app. Free advertising!

Mobile Time Management Tools

#11. Buffer/Hootsuite

For me, these are the ultimate time-savers. Apps that let you schedule your social media posts straight from your phone, because who wants to be worrying about tweeting all the time when you're travelling or on vacation. Both Hootsuite and Buffer are available on iOS and Android (Buffer is even available on BlackBerry!), let you manage multiple accounts, create and edit posts and manage responses.

You can manage up to three accounts on Hootsuite for free and four accounts on Buffer. Both marketing tools can help you shorten and add links to posts, schedule for ideal engagement times, and provides analytics on your posting activity.

#12. Trello

Our team started using Trello this year and there have been killer reviews about it. Trello is a visual way to organize and manage projects-it's a platform that everyone can access to see the status of a certain initiative, assign themselves to a task, and track their progress. It has over 4.6 million users with one million monthly active users, so you know it works. 

And they have (drumroll…) mobile apps on iOS and Android! You can get notifications on your phone or tablet with updates or reminders, and continue to manage projects when you're not in front of your computer.

#13. Slack

Our team is a huge fan of #Slack. It was recently revealed that Slack stands for “Searchable Log of All Conversation and Knowledge”, and it is the jack-of-all-trades when it comes to office communication. You can easily share files, pdfs, images, spreadsheets, and YouTube videos with your co-workers through direct messages, private channels, or open channels. As the name suggests, all of it is accessible through a search-and you can connect various tools to Slack to receive notifications directly within it.

Best of all? They have a great mobile application for android and iOS. Instead of searching through your email or logging into a ton of different platforms you can now just log into your slack account and have everything you need at your fingertips.

Amazon to spend $2.5M on university competition to build “socialbot”

 If you need an Uber, Amazon Alexa has your back. Unfortunately if what you need is a conversation buddy, the personal assistant isn't quite up to the task. In an effort to bolster Alexa's social intelligence, Amazon is putting $2.5 million into a new university competition to design and build “socialbots” for the platform. Engineers will use the Alexa Skills Kit to… Read More

What it means to have our political debates on social media

Social media has become one of the biggest frameworks for our political conversations, for better or worse. Left unchecked, it can lend too much power to the opinionated and agenda-pushing.

While platforms like Facebook and Twitter give us new voices to speak out with, they allow us to drown out opposing ideas with dangerous ease. Even within our own circles, social media tends to benefit the extreme voices over the more moderate ones.

What can we do? This We The Voters short film has some ideas. Read things you disagree with, and retweet with care. When everyone can contribute on social media, we all have some responsibility. Read more...

More about Mashable Video, Politics, Social Media, We The Voters, and Us World

How To Create Facebook Lead Ads That Convert

Larry mentioned them in his list of 10 CRO Truth Bombs. WordStream clients are using them to corral leads in droves. They're cheap. They're effective. The targeting options are so vast and precise that finding new customers is easier than bullseyeing womp rats in your T-16 back home.

I'm talking about Facebook lead ads.

 

If you're not familiar with them, lead ads are Facebook's answer to the jaw-dropping amount of time the average person spends on his or her mobile device. It's no secret that conversions from paid channels tend to take a hit on mobile, so the Zuck and crew decided to eliminate one of the most prohibitive steps for would-be converters: visiting your website.

Instead, with lead ads, you just choose from the Cheesecake Factory-esque menu of targeting options, create a lead form, and watch the (significantly cheaper) scorching hot leads roll in. They can be used to acquire all sorts of information, from potential consumers anywhere in the funnel.

 

And the best part? Contact info collected through lead ads can be used to create new audiences – both custom and lookalike – allowing you to adjust your paid efforts based on where a prospect falls in your funnel or find new, similar prospects.

Sold yet? Of course you are.

But before I delve into how you're going to make your Facebook lead ads irresistible, here are the six simple steps you'll need to take in order to create your first one (assuming you've already got a Facebook Business Manager account).

Facebook Lead Ads For Dummies

 

Once you've signed into your Business Manager account, navigate over to Power Editor.

 

Click the “+Campaign” button on the top left hand side of your screen to open a laundry-list of prospective campaign goals. While many will be familiar (and some more useful than others), the one you want is titled “Collect leads for your business.”

 

Now, let's get granular. Choose your desired audience, targeting parameters, placements, budget, and scheduling. Discussion of this warrants a post of its own, so I won't try to condense a thousand words into twenty. Suffice to say you know your business, your goals, and your target demo better than I do. Get everything calibrated and proceed.

The Power Editor UI will prompt you to create a new lead form or duplicate an existing form. Since we're operating under the assumption that you haven't done this before, you'll only be able to select the former. For future reference, though, be sure to recycle forms when appropriate, but don't use a single form across every lead campaign you run (especially when you're serving lead ads to those already in your funnel).

Next, add a context card. They're “optional,” but trust me: you want to make one. Essentially, a context card is the step between somebody seeing your lead ad and the formfill itself. Take your time crafting the copy that goes on your context card (or hire a professional). Make sure you distill your message down to the most concise version: explain what you're offering, who you are, and why whomever is seconds from giving you their precious contact information should do so. Nothing more.

Once you've finished the context card, it's time to put together your lead form itself. You'll be given more possible fields than you'll know what to do with…

… and that's okay. Because for your first lead ad, we're going to focus on just two of them: email address & full name. Why full instead of “first” and “last” as separate fields? The more boxes a prospect has to complete, the less likely they are to convert. You can use a little bit of Excel wizardry after you've got the data to parse names into separate columns.

Finally, complete the privacy policy and disclaimer and you're ready to rock.

Optimizing Your Facebook Lead Ads

The good news: you know how to make a Facebook lead ad!

The bad: your competition does, too.

Because your competitors are plastering your prospects' timelines with ads, it's important that yours stand out. Now that you know how to make a run-of-the-mill Facebook lead ad, it's time to learn how to make an incredible (read: high converting) one.

Optimizing Targeting for Facebook Lead Ads: Lookalike A Paying Customer

Create lookalike audiences using customers, not prospects.

If you make a lookalike audience of everyone who submits, your reach will be wider, sure, but it'll also be less qualified. By creating lookalikes of your converters instead of everyone who has submitted a lead, you're building a more accurate profile of the sort of person who makes a purchase or becomes a client.

This model is inherently more valuable to your business than a rough estimate of the type of person who might possibly could maybe one time almost sort of be interested in what you have to offer. Niche-ing down is a good thing. Remember that.

Facebook Has More Targeting Options Than Members…

Use them to your advantage!

Get as granular as possible with your campaigns and ad sets, and don't be afraid to experiment. Personally, I like to take any customer data I can get my hands on and look for patterns. From there, you can begin overlapping the traits you uncover using the virtually limitless targeting options available to you. Things to look for include:

• Job titles


• Education


• Relationships


• Age


• Hobbies


• Average income


• Language proficiencies


• Entertainment 

Through all of these and more, you can create highly targeted campaigns outfitted with lead ads that speak directly to the traits you've identified.

Are you a drivers' ed teacher looking for new students? Consider targeting parents in higher-income areas (driving lessons don't come cheap). Flower shop or purveyor of fine chocolates? Seek out people in new relationships, show them a lead ad, and get 'em on your email list.

Duplicate Audiences Are A Waste Of Money

Having a fat stack of ideas out the gate is great. Know what isn't? Trying to test them all on the same audience at once. Patience is key. 

According to Facebook, attempting to target the same audience with multiple lead ad campaigns can result in “under-delivery issues.”

If you're following the advice above (ratcheting down on those lookalike audiences) and leveraging the rest of Facebook's robust targeting options to your advantage, the initial reservoir of some-odd billion people with Facebook accounts has been dammed up and reduced to a faucet's trickle. Your ads are only serving to small, qualified audiences. Under-delivery isn't an option, folks!

 

Your Customers Sleep. Your Ads Should, Too

If you're selling a SaaS product to large businesses, I doubt your potential customers are up at three in the morning on a Tuesday. But things change if your offering is meant for the garage-based startup, or you've cornered the market on glowy, pulsing rave gloves.

Ad scheduling is a great way to avoid wasting time and money serving your finely-tuned lead ads to people catching Z's.

And once your campaigns are up and running, you can add more scheduling. If your data suggests that there are times at which prospects are highly motivated, increase bids (better yet, create a new campaign and find a way to make use of your insight in the ad copy). On the other side of that coin, if data suggests prospects simply aren't interested in forking over their information at dinner time or 51 minutes before their mid-morning snack, scale back.

Optimizing Creative for Facebook Lead Ads

Context Matters...

With lead ads you're asking people to take immediate action. Unlike more traditional ad types, there's nothing standing between the first click and the form fill (unless you count the context card, but that's more complementary than intermediary). As such, in addition to lookin' pretty your creative needs to do a lot of legwork.

 

Ensure that you pair your captivating image with clear copy. Take this Land Rover ad for example. It features concise but captivating language (the percussive consonance makes it clear this tagline wasn't conceived on the first try). The image is striking. And check out that button. It tells the prospect exactly what he or she stands to gain by clicking.

Coupons Rule Everything Around Me

           

Some people won't click on your ad no matter how well it reads or pretty it looks. When it comes to the folded armed curmudgeons in your vertical, incentivize the click.

Look at where in your sales funnel the audience you're targeting with your lead ad falls. If it's the very top or somewhere in the middle? Send free information or offer a subscription. Closer to the bottom? Create buy-in by offering a coupon, a free consultation, or quote.

Whatever your value proposition ends up being, if you want it to grab potential prospects, it must be clear. Emblazoned in neon. The completely irresistible version of the guy at a traffic light spinning a sign for $5 cheese pizzas.

The Context Card: Never Say No To Screen-Time

As I touched on above, the context card isn't optional. That “optional” is just a silly April Fool's joke Facebook forgot to remove from the Business Manager UI. In reality, context cards are necessary.

They allow you to share more information about your offering with a potential prospect in the seconds before he or she is presented with the opportunity to give you valuable information. Use the context card to:

• Highlight benefits your business provides


• Promote a special offer


• Create a double opt-in (qualify your prospects with another “are you sure” button)

Keep Prospects Informed

Let people know how and when you'll contact them. And be sure to follow up. This isn't really a big one if you're just asking for an email address to get someone into your automated funnel, but if you're advertising a free quote or audit, you must reach out. Failure to do so isn't just a waste of your money: it makes you look unprofessional.

Labor Over Your Copy

Don't just cut and paste the same copy every time you make a new lead campaign, and don't jack text from your landing page. The context card is its own, standalone piece of text with a distinct job.

Sure, you can draw inspiration from content you've got stashed away, but rehashing it completely is a bad idea. Consider the specific audience you're targeting with each lead ad. What information would they appreciate? Now, take that even further. What sort of language and tone would they find most appealing? Take a few stabs at writing something that will resonate and have somebody else look at it.

'Every Prospect Under The Sun Is Completing My Forms, But I Can't Find Their Information!' - Every Person to try Facebook Lead Ads

You've made irresistible ads. People are sending you contact info faster than even your autoresponder can respond. Just one question remains…

 

There are currently three ways to fetch lead information from Facebook:

1. Good 'ol CSV. It ain't pretty, but it works. Simply navigate to your Ad Set tab, find the “Results” column (illustrated below) and click the link that says “Leads(form).” You'll want to check this frequently, as there isn't currently any sort of notification system available to marketers.


2. If you use a CRM that syncs with Facebook (so far: Marketo, Salesforce, Driftrock, Oracle, Maropost, Sailthru), your leads will magically appear there!


3. The third option is above my pay grade, but it's possible to develop a custom connection between your back end and the Facebook API. Ask your developer to explain what that means.

Now you know how to make a Facebook Lead Ad. You know how to make it awesome. You know how to track down prospect info. If you've got questions please feel free to get at me on Twitter or share them in the comments below.

Now get out there and woo future customers already!

Facebook rolls out code to nullify Adblock Plus' workaround

 Adblock Plus launched a workaround to Facebook's ad block bypass today that ham-handedly removes posts from friends and Pages, not just ads, according to a statement provided by Facebook to TechCrunch. “We're disappointed that ad blocking companies are punishing people on Facebook as these new attempts don't just block ads but also posts from friends and Pages.… Read More

Here's How to Transform Frontline Staff from Conversion Killers to Valuable Assets

Posted by BeTopLocal

Here's a scenario that may be all-too-familiar:

You've worked with your client to improve their SEO and optimize their pages for conversion. You've set up tracking software and done a great job of delivering qualified leads.

Then your client complains they still aren't closing more deals.

What gives?

What if it's not the tech part of the funnel letting you down? What if your problem is of the human variety?

“Hold up!” you're thinking. “Not my problem!”

Digital agencies often don't think of "interfering" with in-house operations (or don't feel empowered to), and it's easy to wipe your hands of the issue once your ad campaigns are in full swing.

But when you've spent thousands of dollars making the phone ring, you can't sit by idly and allow your client to lose customers to busy phone lines or poor onboarding. If you do, you risk losing the client.

Online marketing doesn't end with the "submit" button or a phone call. Frontline staff are CRITICAL to both your ad campaigns and your client's success.

In this post, I'll share the process we followed to make frontline staff an extension of our digital efforts and grow our client's new patient booking rate to 61%.

Step 1: Earn staff buy-in by solving their problems

Buy-in is tricky. You're an outsider trying to introduce change into a company that's been doing things "their way" for years.

You need to overcome this fear and get staff to buy into your new goals and marketing plans. Once they do, they'll be an unstoppable part of your onboarding process.

But how?

First, interview frontline staff, and make it about helping them vs. instructing them.

Advice from an outsider is seldom welcome, so it's your job to get to know the staff by asking them three simple questions:

• What is the most frustrating thing that happens on a call?


• What do you wish people calling in already knew?


• How could we make your life easier?

By showing staff you want to make their lives simpler and asking them for input, you build credibility and rapport with them while making them feel like you're on their team. What's more, you learn about the information customers currently lack when they call in, which is information you can give them on the landing page ahead of time.

Remember, receptionists are the first point of contact that a customer has with many businesses. They're extremely important for shaping how new prospects view the entire company.

Second, consider offering an incentive for staff to close deals more quickly.

This is a tricky one, as booking clients is, technically, the job of frontline staff; but if there's a way to recognize top performers, monetarily or otherwise, this can become another powerful way to get staff in on the deal.

An incentive could be anything from an office lunch on Friday if more than X number of appointments are successfully scheduled in a week or a gift card if scheduling rates increase by a certain percentage to vacations, TVs, etc. for top performers.

A quick example

One of our clients, a small, local clinic in Utah, was enjoying an influx of quality leads after we launched our Facebook, AdWords, and Pandora ad campaigns. However, long wait times resulted in lost prospects.

To remedy this, we sat down with the staff to learn about their pain points and showed them the ads we were running, then asked them what was missing. We wanted them to have a voice in the changes being made and to know how valuable they were in the onboarding process.

Their feedback was surprising.

Our client was also able to offer a $5-10 incentive for every appointment booked. This incentive motivated receptionists to answer calls and emails as soon as they came in, even on weekends, and reduce calls placed on hold or sent to voicemail.

Once you remove all barriers to staff buy-in, your marketing campaign can really take off. In this case, our client was able to book 203 new leads per month on the strength of staff enthusiasm.

Step 2: Use analytics to diagnose weak points in the funnel

Once the staff is onboard, it's time to dig up some granular results that will help them refine their processes and eliminate the obstacles in the way.

That means tracking and recording calls so that you can provide hard-hitting feedback for your client. The key here is to record calls and take the right lessons away from what you learn.

Get a tool to record phone calls

There are dozens of different platforms for call tracking out there, and most are quite affordable (usually $3-5 per line per month plus a small fee per minute). We wound up choosing CallTrackingMetrics to record calls for its affordability and reliability.

Make sure the staff knows they are being recorded, and that you'll use the information learned from the calls to make their lives easier.

Including a standard "this call may be recorded for quality control" message on calls is also good practice so that you don't violate callers' privacy. (This is not necessary in every state; you can see a list of the applicable rules here.)

Get a tool to trace calls back to digital sources

After evaluating several tools, none did what we needed, so we designed a custom WordPress tracking plugin solution (which you can download for free) to help us attribute converting calls to channels.

This also enables you to see with clarity where poor leads are coming from so you can either improve your landing pages and conversion funnel or keep those leads from coming in at all.

These tools gave us the means to analyze the clinic's onboarding techniques and calculate the cost per lead (CPL) and ROI of our advertising channels.

Listen to incoming calls to identify common causes of drop-offs

Listen for…

• Questions you can proactively answer


• Questions staff try to answer, but shouldn't


• Difficult prospects, and what made them difficult

Track these carefully, then take them back to frontline staff to get their insights and opinions. This is not a time to be accusatory, but to talk through ways to combat common problems.

When you have a clear picture of what your reception staff deal with, you can collaborate with them to turn their weaknesses into strengths, whether on your end in content, or on their end in the way they answer or divert client questions (which we'll cover in the next step).

Step 3: Improve your 'time-to-value' ratio

The main goal of your reception staff should be to get customers off the phone and into the office (or to the next step of the funnel).

You can support this goal by using your landing pages to prevent bottlenecks, as well as having strategies in place that help staff book appointments and navigate difficult situations.

A quick example

One of our clients had a problem that's common to most businesses: Patients wanted all of their questions answered over the phone by front-end staff who weren't qualified or equipped to answer them.

That meant more time on-call. More calls on hold. And more potential patients hanging up, tired of waiting.

We addressed this issue by first solving whatever bottlenecks we could with landing page content:

• We made sure our landing pages answered any FAQs we might have missed so that the receptionists wouldn't be answering them so often


• Second, we worked with the front staff to come up with a very specific strategy and goal for each call, and we provided examples that they could draw from. (Note: This was not a script. It's far more important that your staff understand your "closing strategy." In our case, this was walking reception staff through best-practices that would get new patients to make an appointment.)

To tackle this in a practical way, we worked with frontline staff to help them generate a list of guidelines that not only worked but that they believed in.

We guided the process but gave them ownership over the guidelines.

Here's what we included in our strategy:

Empathy: Make a connection with your caller

It takes less than three seconds to make a good impression, but only one bad experience to drive a new caller away. Knowing this, we drew on best-practice advice for business telephone etiquette and collaborated with staff to come up with our main objectives:

• Answer calls promptly and professionally


• Make a good first impression


• Show you care


• Build confidence


• Be courteous and helpful, even when redirecting calls

To do this, we listened to successful calls and noted what made the best frontline staff successful. How did they answer questions? What were their greetings?

You can do the same, then use this information to draft basic scripts for greetings, redirects, and answering common questions.

Authority: Have clear priorities and achievable goals

Medical clinics have a lot in common with other B2C businesses in that most questions can't be answered over the phone. Receptionists often aren't qualified to speak on behalf of the staff members who are experienced in solving the particular problems that callers have.

The best response to most customer questions is, "That's a great question for_________. Let's get an appointment/consultation scheduled so s/he can answer it."

To set up our goals, we took cues from resources like these Receptionist KPIs and combined them with the personal experiences our client brought to the table.

Our reception staff goals were:

• Ask questions and track responses


• Make onboarding painless


• Show empathy and compassion


• Give hope to callers


• Offer accurate information


• Don't answer questions you're not qualified to answer


• Schedule an appointment

Response: Have a strategy for dealing with difficult callers

You lose most of your callers during high stress periods, especially if it makes new callers wait for long periods of time.

When difficult callers tie up your phone lines or you experience an influx of new callers and you have to manage multiple lines, you risk losing new callers that grow frustrated with waiting.

Our strategies for dealing with difficult callers:

• Stay polite and courteous. Say your greeting, offer your name and ask for the caller's name.


• Avoid saying anything that might upset the caller. Offer them reassurances instead.


• Tell the caller that you understand their frustration and want to help them.


• Stay calm. Remaining calm will calm the caller down too.


• Keep your conversation positive and diplomatic


• Show that you're willing to help them resolve the conflict they're experiencing


• Be empathetic. Think like the caller and understand that their problem is important.

Our strategies for managing multiple lines:

• Prioritize calls in the order they come in


• If a second call comes in and you need to put a caller on hold, get permission to do so


• Solve simple problems for the new caller if possible (e.g., a transfer request) to free up the line


• If the second caller also needs your help, ask them to hold while you finish with the first caller


• Don't make callers on hold feel neglected. Check in with them periodically if your first call takes a long time to resolve.


• If possible, have a system in place so that you don't have to place callers on hold at all (e.g., transfer the call to another staff member or an automated attendant)


• Keep a pen and paper handy. Take notes whenever necessary.

Frontline staff are a critical part of the funnel. With the right approach, their work can be optimized.

You might not think it's your prerogative as an agency to train reception staff, but this is an opportunity to bring the principles of online conversions to the offline staff and unify the client's entire team to get better results for everyone.

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Facebook is testing video ads during Live broadcasts

 If you watch a lot of Facebook Live broadcasts, get ready to see some ads. The company is now testing short video ads that will play during breaks in Facebook Live broadcasts, they confirmed to Adage. The move shouldn't be a surprise for anyone who follows Facebook and their various video products. Video ads are lucrative for Facebook and a Live product devoid of ads would cause… Read More