Search Elite – 9th May 2017 Search Elite, @thesearchelite – the conference that will change the way people do search marketing…

Search Elite – 9th May 2017 //

from TheMarketingblog http://www.themarketingblog.co.uk/2017/03/search-elite-9th-may-2017-search-elite-thesearchelite-the-conference-that-will-change-the-way-people-do-search-marketing/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=search-elite-9th-may-2017-search-elite-thesearchelite-the-conference-that-will-change-the-way-people-do-search-marketing

How to Start a Business in 2017: A Complete Guide for Startup Entrepreneurs

When you start an online business, there are thousands of questions that need answering. How much money do you really need to start a business? How do you register it with the government? How do you build a website? Who’s your target customer, and what tactics and messaging should you use to reach them?

You’ll quickly find that coming up with the idea for a new business is the easy part. Actually executing on that idea is where it gets interesting.

Execution is what differentiates a great thinker from an entrepreneur.

Everyone wants more visitors, more qualified leads, and more revenue. But starting a business isn’t one of those "if you build it, they will come" situations. In order to build a successful company, you’ll need to create and fine-tune a business plan, assess your finances, complete all the legal paperwork, pick your partners, choose the best tools and systems to help you get your marketing and sales off the ground … and a whole lot more.

We’re here to guide you through that process. In this post, you’ll find a library of the best free tools and resources to help you start selling and marketing your business. Keep scrolling, and you’ll find a guide on how to start a business, from the paperwork and finances to defining your business goals to building and growing your business online.

Free Tools & Resources for Startups

Before we dive into our list, we want to make sure you know about our scholarship program HubSpot for Startups. It's a 90% scholarship for seed-stage startups that includes all of HubSpot's software and tools to help you acquire customers and grow, as well as unlimited technical support and access to HubSpot's community of thousands of founders worldwide, You can learn more and apply to the HubSpot for Startups program here.

Now, let's get into HubSpot's best free marketing and sales tools and resources, followed by a complete guide for how to set up and finance your business.

The Best Free Marketing Resources

Marketing Plan: A Blueprint for Start-Ups

A 20-page guide that covers how to build a sales and marketing machine, which demand generation activities with the biggest return on investment, and more.

HubSpot Marketing Free

Our free marketing tool that gives you insight into what every lead does before and after they fill out a form. It includes built-in analytics that make it easy to learn which pages, offers, and traffic sources are driving the most conversions for you.

Website Grader

Enter your website URL and email address, and we'll send you a detailed grade on your website's performance, mobile, SEO, and security, along with detailed tips and resources for making impactful improvements on your website.

Press Release Templates

Downloadable press release templates you can customize, along with a corresponding guide to building a press release and promotion plan.

Case Study Templates

Downloadable case study templates that show you a sample case study structure from top to bottom, along with business case study examples, tips on finding the right candidates, advice on how to reach out to them, and sample interview questions to inform your case study content.

386+ Content Creation Templates

Free templates for all your visual content creation needs when you're first starting a business. The kit includes 100 social media image templates, 8 PowerPoint presentation templates, 50 call-to-action templates, 15 infographic templates, 5 ebook templates, 5 blog post templates, and more.

How to Create Email Newsletters

A guide with tips for writing, designing, optimizing, and measuring a successful email newsletter -- including some awesome, real-life examples of great email newsletters.

The Best Free Sales Resources

Email Signature Generator

A free tool that creates a professional email signature you can easily add to your Gmail, Outlook, Apple Mail, Yahoo Mail, or any other email provider.

21 Sales Email Templates

A list of 21 email templates that have been used with great success by real companies like us here at HubSpot, as well as folks at Troops, Chet Holmes International, FEED Agency, and Groove. These email templates have closed a $100,000 deal, seen an 80% response rate within 24 hours after a phone call, and received a 33% response rate after the prospect went dark.

Sales Call Scripts

An easy-to-follow sales call checklist that can help you build rapport and develop trust, understand the prospect’s pain points, identify key decision-makers, and secure a follow-up meeting.

Daniel Pink's Sell Like a Human Video Series

A monthly video series where Sales Expert Daniel Pink and special guests will solve your biggest sales challenges in under 30 minutes.

Sales Process Template

A simple, easy-to-follow sales process template to help managers coach their inside sales reps into following a proven, standardized process from discovery to close. It also includes which key activities sales reps must follow to keep deals moving forward, and important sales strategies for increasing productivity, efficiency, and data visibility.

Sales Close Rate

Compare your sales close rate against your industry competitors using data from over 8,900 companies segmented by 28 industries.

Sales Email Copywriting Course

The language and tone you use in your sales emails can make or break your sales deals. This course was created by Joanna Wiebe, the creator of Copy Hackers and the original conversion copywriter. In it, she covers how to write sales emails that help you close more deals.

The Best CRM

HubSpot CRM is the only free CRM that lets you manage your pipeline, automate the most tedious sales tasks, and make it easier to close deals quickly. You'll end up doing more deals and less data entry. Plus, you can manage up to 1,000,000 contacts, users, and storage without any expiration date.

Now that we've covered the best tools and resources for starting a business, let's get into how to actually start one.

How to Start a Business: A Complete Guide

Starting a business involves a whole lot of moving pieces, some more exciting than others. Brainstorming business names? Fun! Filing taxes? ... Not so fun. The trick to successfully getting your business off the ground is to meticulously plan and organize your materials, prioritize properly, and stay on top of the status and performance of each and every one of these moving parts.

From registering with the government to getting the word out about your business to making key financial decisions, here’s an overview of what you'll need to do to start a successful business.

The Legal Paperwork

Business Structure, Government Registration, Taxes & More

The not-so-romantic part of a starting a new business is all the paperwork and legal activities. This includes things like determining the legal structure of your business, nailing down your business name, registering with the government, and -- depending on your business structure and industry --  getting a tax code, a business license, and/or a seller’s permit. 

Furthermore, businesses are regulated on the federal, the state, and sometimes even local level. It’s important to check what’s required on all three of those levels. When you register your business with the government, be sure you’re covering registration on all the levels required for your business’ location. Your business won’t be a legal entity without checking these boxes, so stay on top of it. 

Clearly, it can be overwhelming to figure out what legal steps you need to take for your particular case, so let’s break it down. Below, you’ll find a brief explanation of what goes into each one of these steps, along with links to helpful resources where you can dig in to the details. (Note: These steps are for starting a business in the U.S. only.) 

Legal Structure: The 4 Common Business Types

The legal structure of your business will determine what you need to do to register with the government, how you’re taxed, what risks you need to take on, and so on. Many people starting a business will choose to register either as a corporation or a Limited Liability Company (LLC) because those two structures will give owners limited liability protection. But, on the other hand, there’s a lot more paperwork and expense associated with a corporation or LLC.

Here’s a list of four common business structures, along with the pros and cons of each and how taxes work for each one.

1) Sole Proprietorship

Example: Freelance graphic design.

What it is: A sole proprietorship is a business that’s owned and run by one person, where the government makes no legal distinction between the person who owns the business and the business itself. It’s the simplest and most common way to operate the business, and the business can even have its own distinctive name if you register what’s called a Doing Business Name (DBA). We’ll get back to that in the “Naming Businesses” section.

Pros: It’s easy and inexpensive to create a sole proprietorship because there’s only one owner, and that owner has complete control over all business decisions. Tax preparation is also pretty simple since a sole proprietorship is not taxed separately from its owner

Cons: It can be dramatically more difficult to raise money and get investors or loans because there’s no legal structure that promises repayment if the business fails. Also, since the owner and the business are legally the same, the owner is personally liable for all the debts and obligations of the business.

How taxes work: The individual proprietor owns and manages the business and is responsible for all transactions, including debts and liabilities. Income and losses are taxed on the individual’s personal income tax return at ordinary rates. In addition, you are also subject to payroll taxes, or self-employment taxes, on the money you earn. (More on self-employment taxes later.) Find IRS tax forms here.

2) Partnership 

Example: Multiple doctors maintaining separate practices in the same building.

What it is: A partnership is a single business where two or more people share ownership, and each owner contributes to all aspects of the business as well as shares in the profits and losses of the business.

Pros: It’s generally pretty easy to form a business partnership, and it doesn’t tend to be super expensive, either. Having two or more people equally invested in the business’ success allows you to pool resources. It also means you have access to more than one person’s skill set and expertise.

Cons: Just like a sole proprietor, partners have full, shared liability if the business goes south. That also means that partners aren’t just liable for their own actions, but also the actions of their partner(s). There is a variant on partnerships called a limited liability partnership, or LLP, that protects against that -- which is how most law firms are organized, for example.

Finally, when more than one person is involved in decisions, there’s room for disagreement -- which means it’s important to have an explicit agreement over how the obligations and earnings will be split, especially if/when things go wrong.

How taxes work: To form a partnership, you have to register your business with your state, a process generally done through your Secretary of State’s office. Find IRS tax forms here. 

3) Limited Liability Company (LLC)

Example: A small design firm.

What it is: LLCs are a type of business structure that's more complex than sole proprietorships and partnerships, but less complex than corporations. They are called “pass-through entities” because they’re not subject to a separate level of tax. Most states don’t restrict ownership on LLCs, and so members can include individuals, corporations, and even other LLCs and foreign entities. Most states also permit “single-member” LLCs, those having only one owner.

Pros: Founders have a lot of flexibility when it comes to governance issues.

Cons: LLCs are often more complex than sole proprietorships or partnerships, which means higher initial costs, and certain venture capital funds are hesitant to invest in LLCs because of tax considerations and the aforementioned complexity. That being said, they’re simpler to operate than a corporation because they aren’t subject to as many formalities.

How taxes work: LLCs have the benefit of a “flow-through” tax treatment, meaning that the owners -- not the LLC -- are the ones who are taxed. Having only one level of tax imposed makes taxes easier. Find IRS tax forms here.

4) Corporation 

Example: Microsoft, Coca-Cola, Toyota Motor, and almost all well known businesses.

What it is: A legal entity that is separate and distinct from its owners, and has most of the rights and responsibilities that an individual possesses (to enter into contracts, loan and borrow money, sue and be sued, hire employees, own assets, and pay taxes.) It’s more complex than the other business structures, and it’s generally suggested for larger, established companies with multiple employees.

Pros: They make seeking venture financing easy.

Cons: Because they’re complex than other business structures, they can have costly administrative fees, and more complicated tax and legal requirements.

How taxes work: Corporations are required to pay federal, state, and in some cases, local taxes. Any profit a corporation makes is taxed to the corporation when earned, and then is taxed to the shareholders when distributed as dividends, which creates a double tax. The corporation does not get a tax deduction when it distributes dividends to shareholders. Shareholders cannot deduct any loss of the corporation, but they are also not responsible directly for taxes on their earnings -- just on the dividends they give to shareholders. Find IRS tax forms here.

Choosing & Registering Your Business Name

Establishing a business name is a little more complicated than making a list and picking your favorite. You’ll use the legal name of your business on all your government forms and applications, including your application for employer tax IDs, licenses, and permits.

If you’re using a name other than your personal name, then you need to register it with your state government so they know you’re doing business with a name other than your given name. 

First thing’s first: Before you register, you need to make sure the name you want is available in your state. Business names are registered on a state-by-state basis, so it’s possible that a company in another state could have the same name as yours. This is only concerning if there’s a trademark on the name. Do a Trademark search of your desired name to avoid expensive issues down the road.

Speaking of who’s using which names online, see if your desired domain names are available by doing an online domain search. Do the same with your desired social media handles. If the domain name and/or social media handles you want aren’t available, then some of you might consider changing your business name. 

For new corporations and LLCs: Your business name is automatically registered with your state when you register your business -- so you don’t have to go through a separate process. There are rules for naming a corporation and LLC, which you can read about here.

For sole proprietorships, partnerships, and existing corporations and LLCs (if you want to do business with a name other than their registered name), you’ll need to register what’s called a “Doing Business As” (DBA) name. You can do so either by going to your county clerk’s office or with your state government, depending which state you’re in. Learn how to do that here.

Want to trademark your business name? A trademark protects words, names, symbols, and logos that distinguish goods and services. Filing for a trademark costs less than $300, and you can learn how to do it here.

All About Business Taxes

Business owners are obligated to pay specific federal taxes, and the amount of those taxes is determined by the form of business entity that you establish. All businesses except for partnerships need to file an annual income tax return. Partnerships file what’s called an information return. 

Any business that’s owned and operated in the United States needs an Employer Identification Number (EIN), which you can apply for on the IRS’ website here.

Once you’re registered, it’s time to figure out which taxes you’ll be responsible for.

Self-employment tax (SE tax) is a Social Security and Medicare tax for people who work for themselves, i.e. business owners. SE taxes require filing Schedule SE (Form 1040) if your net earnings from self-employment were $400 or more. (Note: There are special rules and exceptions for fishing crew members, notary public, and more, which you can read about on the IRS’ website here.)

When you have employees, you (as the employer) have certain employment tax responsibilities that you need to pay, as well as forms you need to file. Employment taxes include Social Security and Medicare taxes, federal income tax withholding, and federal unemployment (FUTA) tax. Learn more about employment taxes for small businesses on the IRS’ website here.

Excise taxes are also something you need to consider, depending what you sell, where you operate, and so on. For example, in the U.S., there’s a federal excise tax on certain trucks, truck tractors, and buses used on public highways. See which excise taxes you might be responsible for on the IRS’ website here. 

Seller’s Permit

If your business sells tangible property to the public either as a wholesaler or retailer, then in most states, you need to apply for a seller’s permit. “Tangible property” simply means physical items, like clothing, vehicles, toys, construction materials, and so on. In some states, a seller’s permit is required for service-oriented business, too, such as accountants, lawyers, and therapists.

The seller’s permit allows you to collect sales tax from buyers. You’ll then pay that sales tax to the state each quarter by putting the sales tax permit number on the state’s tax payment form. 

You can register for a seller's permit through your state's Board of Equalization, Sales Tax Commission, or Franchise Tax Board. To help you find the appropriate offices, find your state on this IRS website. 

Business License

Almost every business needs some form of license or permit to operate legally -- but the requirements vary, which can get confusing. Which specific licenses or permits does your business need? To figure that out, go to this SBA.gov website and select the state from which you’re operating your business. It’ll tell you the specific license and permit requirements in that state. 

Financing your Business

From the day you start building your business until the point where you can make a consistent profit, you need to finance your operation and growth with start-up capital.

Some founders can finance their business entirely on their own dime or through friends and family, which is called “bootstrapping.” This obviously gives the business owners a ton of flexibility for running the business, although it means taking on a larger financial risk -- and when family’s involved, can lead to awkward holiday dinner conversations if things go wrong.

Many founders need external start-up capital to get their business off the ground. If that sounds like you, keep on reading to learn about six of the most common kinds of external capital you can raise.

1) Seed Financing 

If you’re looking for a relatively small amount of money, say, the investigation of a market opportunity or the development of the initial version of a product or service, then seed financing might be for you. Oftentimes, this money will come from the founders themselves, from friends and family, from angel investors, and even from potential customers.

There are many different kinds of seed financing, but the one you’ve probably heard of most is called seed round financing. In this case, someone will invest in your company in exchange for preferred stock. If your company gets sold or liquidated, then investors who hold preferred stock often have the right to get their investment back -- and, in most cases, an additional return, called “preferred dividends” or “liquidation preferences” -- before holders of common stock are paid. 

2) Accelerators

Accelerators are highly competitive programs that typically involve applying and then competing against other startups in a public pitch event or demo day. In addition to winning funding and seed capital, winners of these programs are also rewarded with mentorship and educational programs.

Although accelerators were originally mostly tech companies and centered around Silicon Valley, you can now find them all over the country and in all different industries. If this sounds like something you’d be interested in, here’s a list of the top accelerators in the United States to get you started.

3) Small Business Loan 

If you have a really rock-solid plan for how you’ll spend the money in place, then you might be able to convince a bank, a lender, a community development organization, or a micro-lending institution to grant you a loan. 

There are many different types of loans, including loans with the bank, real estate loans, equipment loans, and more. To successfully get one, you’re going to need to articulate exactly how you’ll spend every single penny -- so make sure you have a solid business plan in place before you apply. You can learn more about SBA.gov’s loan programs here.

4) Crowdfunding

You might ask yourself, what about companies that get funding through platforms like Kickstarter and Indiegogo? That’s called crowdfunding, which is a newer way of funding a business. 

More importantly, it typically doesn’t entail giving partial ownership of the business away. Instead, it’s a way of getting funding not from potential co-owners, but from potential fans and customers who want to support the idea, but not necessarily own it. What you give donors in exchange is entirely up to you -- and typically, people will come away with early access to a product, or a special version of a product, or a meet-and-greet with the founders.

When you crowdfund your business, you open an account on those platforms and publish a detailed description of your business, your goals, and how much money you need and why. From there, anyone with an internet connection can contribute money toward helping your business via an online donation. The better story you tell in your crowdfunding campaign website, the more likely you’ll be to get donations.

5) Venture Capital Financing

Only a very small percentage of businesses are either fit for venture capital or have access to it. All the other methods described earlier are available to the vast majority of new businesses.

If you’re looking for a significant amount of money to start your company and can prove you can quickly grow its value, then venture capital financing is probably the right move for you. However, even though venture capital financing is fashionable, it’s rarely available to startups. In fact, many people believe it should be avoided altogether unless you’ve got a billion dollar idea.

Venture capital financing usually means one or more venture capital firms make large investments in your company in exchange for preferred stock of the company -- but, in addition to getting that preferred return like they would in series seed financing, venture capital investors also usually get governance rights, like a seat on the Board of Directors or approval rights on certain transactions. VC financing typically occurs when a company can demonstrate a significant business opportunity to quickly grow the value of the company but requires significant capital to do so.

Well, there you have it. We hope this post has helped give you a better idea of what it takes to start your own business -- from setting up all the legal and tax paperwork, all the way to actually marketing and selling your product or service. The execution is up to you. Good luck out there!

from HubSpot Marketing Blog https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/how-to-start-a-business

The University of Essex appoint digital agency Delete

Following a competitive tender process and pitch, the University of Essex has appointed digital agency Delete to drive the next phase of a digital transformation programme, which will see the agency re-define the organisation’s digital presence. The University of Essex were seeking a collaborative agency partner who not only understood the challenges of the higher [more…]

from TheMarketingblog http://www.themarketingblog.co.uk/2017/02/the-university-of-essex-appoint-digital-agency-delete/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-university-of-essex-appoint-digital-agency-delete

February Social Media News: Weather on Facebook, SNL on Snapchat & More

We spend a lot of time on social media sites -- globally, it’s around two hours per day. But for all of that time spent social networking, we may not always know what’s going on behind the scenes with the sites themselves.

To help you save time while staying informed, we’re launching a monthly social media news roundup.

This month, we’ll discuss Snapchat’s growth and content diversification, Google’s step into live-streaming, and other changes worth knowing about. The list isn’t exhaustive, but you can expect to learn the major highlights in the social media space this month -- what was launched, what changed, and what these stories could mean for marketers.

10 of the Biggest Social Media News Stories This Month

1) The Washington Post starts curating content for Snapchat Discover.

The Washington Post announced it would become Snapchat's first editorial partner to provide breaking news updates on the platform. The Post will publish multiple times per day as headlines break in its print and online newspaper editions so Snapchatters can easily consume the content in a more visual way. Snapchat is all about innovative visual content, and this step moves Snapchat in the direction of becoming a content destination site instead of just a content sharing site. Here's what it will look like on the Discover tab (when a Snapchat user swipes to the left):

Source: The Washington Post

2) Saturday Night Live produces its first skit exclusively for Snapchat.

NBC's Saturday Night Live produced its first short comedy sketch published exclusively on its Snapchat Story. Snapchat plans to produce a series of shorts from Saturday Night Live and other shows on the network. To watch the next short, add Saturday Night Live on Snapchat (@nbcsnl).

SNL is a viewewship juggernaut -- almost 11 million people watch it each week. If it sees success with posting original content on Snapchat outside of its regular distribution strategies on YouTube and other social media platforms, marketers might consider producing their own "shorts" on Snapchat and seeing how they perform.

Source: Saturday Night Live via Snapchat

3) Snap Inc. files for $3 billion initial public offering (IPO).

Snapchat's parent company, Snap Inc., filed for a $3 billion IPO on February 2nd. After rebranding as a camera company and launching Snapchat Spectacles in September 2016, marketers eagerly waited to hear what they would do next.

Snap Inc. now faces intensified competition from other social media platforms with larger user bases that have adopted features similar to Snapchat's. For example, Instagram launched its own version of Stories last year, and it currently has more users making Stories than all of Snapchat's total user base. Marketers should keep an eye on how Snapchat evolves and which platform is better suited for ephemeral content for their audiences.

Source: Securities and Exchange Commission 

4) Snapchat launches first original reality show on A&E Network.

Snap Inc. announced its forthcoming partnership with A&E to produce "Second Chance," an unscripted reality television show about breakups on Snapchat. The show will diversify audiences for both Snapchat and A&E and get existing Snapchat and A&E audiences on the other platforms. Marketers who aren't already advertising on Snapchat may want to start doing so as it grows its audience even further with original content.

Source: Deadline

5) YouTube launches mobile live-streaming for creators with 10,000 subscribers or more.

YouTube took a big step toward competing in the live streaming video space by launching mobile live video recording for users with over 10,000 subscribers at the beginning of February. YouTube hopes to beat out the competition -- Facebook, Twitter, Periscope, and Instagram have similar live streaming features -- by providing higher quality to the thousands of creators already publishing frequently on the platform. Given the searchability of YouTube videos in Google Search, marketers might consider broadening their video strategy to include live video on YouTube, too.

Source: YouTube

6) Facebook adds a weather tool to desktop and mobile apps.

In early February, Facebook started rolling out its in-app weather tool that lets users see five-day forecasts on their Facebook News Feed. Additionally, users can receive notifications about weather alerts at specific times -- like before they leave the house in a rainstorm. Facebook continues to make the site a destination, one-stop shop for users, so marketers should make sure to dedicate strategy and budget toward producing content and ads for the platform with a massive, engaged user base.

Source: TechCrunch

7) Facebook cracks down on discriminatory advertising.

On February 8th, Facebook updated its advertising policies to explicitly prevent discrimination on the platform. Previously, it was possible for advertisers to target based on race, ethnicity, and other demographic traits. In recent months, Facebook has taken steps to be more responsible to its community of users -- by starting the Facebook Journalism Project in part to prevent fake news, for example. Marketers should make sure to review the new advertising policies to ensure that ads aren't potentially discriminatory against users.

Source: Facebook

8) Instagram experiments with publishing photo albums.

At the beginning of the month, Instagram started beta-testing the ability to publish up to 10 photos in a single post on the platform. It's only being tested with a few Android users for now, but when it's rolled out to all users, the Instagram news feed will start looking more like Facebook's if users can publish photo albums, or galleries. If your audience is highly engaged on Instagram, or if you market physical products, galleries could be a unique approach to generating engagement. Here's what uploading looked like in one user's app:

Source: Twitter

9) Medium announces new subscription service.

Medium CEO Ev Williams announced that Medium would launch a subscription product to develop additional revenue streams apart from simply advertising. This news came shortly on the heels of the layoffs of 50 Medium staff members to move toward a model where storytelling quality is prioritized over clicks and shares. Medium publishers should keep their eyes peeled for updates on any algorithmic changes coming with this new direction that could impact their readership.

Source: TechCrunch

10) Pinterest adds Visual Discovery to search through your camera.

Pinterest launched new visual search tools that will enable users to point and shoot their camera and receive suggested Pins based on photos they capture. Users capture photos through Pinterest Lens, the in-app camera, and the app starts suggesting Pins related to their search. For example, Pinterest says that if users take a photo of a pair of shoes, the app will suggest clothing Pins that could work as an outfit with the shoes. This tool makes visual discovery much easier, and users might be more willing to purchase from the app when their ideas have context from suggested Pins. Marketers and sellers on Pinterest should improve Pinterest strategies to fully take advantage of the ability to be found as a result of this update.

Source: Pinterest

Did we miss any big social media stories? Share with us in the comments below.

from HubSpot Marketing Blog https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/social-media-stories-february

ICYMI: An Animated Guide to Google's Biggest 2016 Algorithm Updates [Infographic]

Sometimes, it seems like keeping up with a search engine's algorithm is like learning a new language. Only, it's a language that keeps updating over time and changing with things like technological advances, evolving topic interests, and constant improvements to user experience. And often, it seems like those changes are quiet -- like there's no way to find out about them unless you, say, subscribe to a blog that keeps you in the loop.

While many marketers make the time to do that -- which is great -- there are days, weeks, and months when constantly keeping up with Google's algorithm is a task that gets pushed to the wayside. But SEO is more important than ever, and has many implications for inbound marketing, especially as mobile usage continues to rise. It's not just about traffic anymore. SEO and its accompanying algorithm updates are soup-to-nuts measures of user experience.

But what pieces of the user's experience are reflected in these algorithm changes? And is there a way to keep up with them in manageable chunks, as many people like to do when they're learning a new skill? Yes -- starting with the infographic below.

You see, some years, the algorithm undergoes more changes than in others, and 2016 was a big one. Luckily, the folks at E2M compiled the major Google algorithm updates from that year into this visual, animated representation. So relax -- you've got this, with a fun, informative image to help.

from HubSpot Marketing Blog https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/googles-biggest-2016-algorithm-updates

NewVoiceMedia wins three 2017 Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service

NewVoiceMedia, a leading global provider of inside sales and contact centre technology that helps businesses sell more, serve better and grow faster, has scooped three Stevie Awards. The company claimed bronze in the ‘Contact Center Solution – New Version’, ‘Sales Automation Solution – New Version’ and ‘Sales or Customer Service Solutions Technology Partner of the [more…]

from TheMarketingblog http://www.themarketingblog.co.uk/2017/02/newvoicemedia-wins-three-2017-stevie-awards-for-sales-customer-service/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=newvoicemedia-wins-three-2017-stevie-awards-for-sales-customer-service

5 Services Your Agency Shouldn't Offer in 2017

The success of a marketing agency isn't just tied to what you do (and do well) but also to the services you don't provide.

The services we're going to discuss today are -- in our judgment -- firmly in the "don't" column. They're either paths that have already been well-trodden by other big players, obsolete tactics that are starting to lose relevance, or services that don't fit well into the modern marketing playbook.

If you're thinking of adding any of the following four services in 2017, it might be time to change up your agency's approach this year.

5 Services Your Agency Shouldn't Offer in 2017

1) Facebook Killed the Video Ad

Video is touted as an excellent way to engage customers and convert leads, but it can also be relatively expensive and inconvenient to produce. If you agency hasn't yet made the leap into video production, consider your next move carefully -- investing in digital video capabilities is a high-risk, high reward strategy.

But how high is that reward, exactly? Late last year, Facebook drew ire when it revealed it had been artificially inflating video viewership statistics since 2014. If major video platforms have a history of inaccurately reporting views, it raises some big questions about the dependability of video ROI. 

If concerns about ROI don't give you pause, think about this: specialized video marketing agencies have been doing video longer, know the marketplace better, and will have larger budgets. They're also beginning to build in advanced features, such as interactive video, and 360-degree video ads. As a video neophyte, you're unlikely to be able to offer these capabilities if you're building a video service from the ground up in 2017.

2) Hang Up on Appointment Setting

Appointment setting has always been a weird fit in the marketing universe. Essentially, it's like running a sales bullpen as a service (SBaaS?), which really has nothing to do with the typical content generation and placement duties of a traditional agency. Therefore, it's going to be difficult and expensive for any agency to boot up an appointment setting service from scratch -- and again, what's the benefit?

The ROI of cold calling has always been low -- and it's been getting lower. A survey from the middle of last year shows that a large majority of sales professionals think that the effectiveness of cold calling has shrunk dramatically over the last several years.

A lot of people just don't have phones at their desk any more, and most will simply hang up on numbers that they don't already know. That's why it's probably a good reason to hang up on appointment setting in 2017.

3) Market Research: Don't Compete, Collaborate

For your dollar, it's nearly always going to be more lucrative to partner with an existing market research service than to build one of your own. As with video, the incumbents are going to rule -- they've been around longer, know their subject better, and have more money to burn. In this case, however, it's better to adopt that old maxim, "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em."

There's absolutely no shame in collaborating with a pre-existing market research agency. In fact, marketing collaboration has increased across the board. Last year, most client-side marketers (52%), collaborated with external agencies. The most common reason for this was a skills gap. If client-side marketers know that it's okay to collaborate in the case of a skills gap, agencies should know it too.

4) Approaching the Link Building Apocalypse

Remember the "Mobilegeddon?" A new revision of the Google search algorithm set to raise the visibility of mobile sites at the expense of their desktop-bound competitors. The effect wasn't initially epochal, but it did cause several major sites to drop in the rankings. Soon, link building may undergo a similar collapse.

Back in September, a new update to the Google algorithm known as Penguin went online. Its goal has been to find and penalize sites that operate in ways designed to game SEO. Link building isn't shady by definition, but many companies have been using it in shady ways.

One example is by building private blog networks (PBNs) with no purpose except to link back to agency generated content. This Fall's Penguin update -- plus a secretive update that launched in February -- appears to be specifically targeted at PBNs. Now, the black-hat link building community has been thrown into turmoil.

As with most of the services listed above, if you've been link building for a while, and you've been doing it in a balanced and organic manner, you're probably in the clear. If you haven't been link building at all, and don't know where to begin, 2017 probably isn't the best year to start.

Stick with What Works

To make it as a marketing agency, you don't necessarily need to break new ground -- but agencies should probably avoid the well-trodden paths. In the examples above, the marketplace of ideas is either so crowded that a new player can't really get a toehold, or the edifice is beginning to crumble. Black-hat SEO tactics never have a great deal of longevity, and even venerable tactics such as cold-calling are seeing their last days.

With that in mind, the principles for agency success still haven't changed. Iterate on successful strategies. Collaborate when necessary to aid in the success of your clients. Keep on like this, and when you find the idea that does put you over the top, Facebook-like success may not be out of reach.

from HubSpot Marketing Blog https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/services-your-agency-shouldnt-offer-in-2017

[Watch] The new 27″ Smartphone from Giant iTab – presented by founder Mark Jones

info@giantitab.com +44 (0) 20 3542 1645 www.giantitab.com Following on from the success of their award-winning 42″ Smartphone solution, Giant iTab are launching a NEW 27″ Desktop Smartphone complete with:- • Fully enclosed Smartphone housing & stand• Built in Hi-Res Camera• Rotation arm for both Landscape and Portrait orientation Perfect for exhibitions, retail, banking, corporate, hotels & [more…]

from TheMarketingblog http://www.themarketingblog.co.uk/2017/02/watch-the-new-27-smartphone-from-giant-itab-presented-by-founder-mark-jones/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=watch-the-new-27-smartphone-from-giant-itab-presented-by-founder-mark-jones

How to Create Content That Keeps Earning Links (Even After You Stop Promoting It)

Posted by kerryjones

Do your link building results look something like this?

1. Start doing outreach
2. Get links
3. Stop doing outreach
4. No more links

Everyone talks about the long-term benefits of using content marketing as part of a link building strategy. But without the right type of content, your experience may be that you stop earning links as soon as you stop doing outreach.

In this sense, you have to keep putting gas in the car for it to keep running (marketing “gas” = time, effort, and resources). But what if there was a way to fill up the car once, and that would give it enough momentum to run for months or even years?

An example of this is a salary negotiations survey we published last year on Harvard Business Review. The study was picked up by TechCrunch months after we had finished actively promoting it. We didn’t reach out to TechCrunch. Rather, this writer presumably stumbled upon our content while doing research for his article.

So what’s the key to long-term links? Content that acts as a source.

The goal is to create something that people will find and link to when they’re in need of sources to cite in content they are creating. Writers constantly seek out sources that will back up their claims, strengthen an argument, or provide further context for readers. If your content can serve as a citation, you can be in a good position to earn a lot of passive links.

Read on for information about which content types are most likely to satisfy people in need of sources and tips on how to execute these content types yourself.

Original research and new data

Content featuring new research can be extremely powerful for building authoritative links via a PR outreach strategy.

A lot of the content we create for our clients falls under this category, but not every single link that our client campaigns earn are directly a result of us doing outreach.

In many cases, a large number of links to our client research campaigns earn come from what we call syndication. This is what typically plays out when we get a client’s campaign featured on a popular, authoritative site (which is Site A in the following scenario):

• Send content pitch to Site A.
• Site A publishes article linking to content.
• Site B sees content featured on Site A. Site B publishes article linking to content.
• Site C sees content featured on Site A. Site C publishes article linking to content.
• And so on…

So, what does this have to do with long-term link earning? Once the content is strategically seeded on relevant sites using outreach and syndication, it is well-positioned to be found by other publishers.

Site A’s content functions as the perfect citation for these additional publishers because it’s the original source of the newsworthy information, establishing it as the authority and thus making it more likely to be linked to. (This is what happened in the TechCrunch example I shared above.)

Examples

In a recent Experts on the Wire podcast, guest Andy Crestodina talked about the “missing stat.” According to Andy, most industries have “commonly asserted, but rarely supported” statements. These “stats” are begging for someone to conduct research that will confirm or debunk them. (Side note: this particular podcast episode inspired this post – definitely worth a listen!)

To find examples of content that uncovers a missing stat in the wild, we can look right here on the Moz blog…

Confirming industry assumptions

When we did our native advertising versus content marketing study, we went into it with a hypothesis that many fellow marketers would agree with: Content marketing campaigns perform better than native advertising campaigns.

This was a missing stat; there hadn’t been any studies done proving or debunking this assumption. Furthermore, there wasn’t any publicly available data about the average number of links acquired for content marketing campaigns. This was a concrete data point a lot of marketers (including us!) wanted to know since it would serve as a performance benchmark.

As part of the study, we surveyed 30 content marketing agencies about how many links the average content marketing campaign earned, in addition to other questions related to pricing, client KPIs, and more.

After the research was published here on Moz, we did some promotion to get our data featured on Harvard Business Review, Inc, and Marketing Land. This data is still being linked to and shared today without us actively promoting it, such as this mention on SEMRush’s blog and this mention on the Scoop It blog (pictured below).

To date, it’s been featured on more than 80 root domains and earned dozens of co-citations. It’s worth noting that this has been about far more than acquiring high-quality links; this research has been extremely effective for driving new business to our agency, which it continues to do to this day.

Debunking industry assumptions

But research doesn’t always confirm presumptions. For example, Buzzsumo and Moz’s research collaboration examined a million online articles. A key finding of their research: There was no overall correlation between sharing and linking. This debunked a commonly held assumption among marketers that content that gets a lot of shares will earn a lot of links, and vice versa. To date, this post has received an impressive 403 links from 190 root domains (RDs) according to Open Site Explorer.

How to use this strategy

To find original research ideas, look at how many backlinks the top results have gotten for terms like:

• [Industry topic] report
• [Industry topic] study
• [Industry topic] research

Then, using the MozBar, evaluate what you see in the top SERPs:

• Have the top results gotten a sizable number of backlinks? (This tells you if this type of research has potential to attract links.)
• Is the top-ranking content outdated? Can you provide new information? (Try Rand’s tips on leveraging keywords + year.)
• Is there a subtopic you could explore?

Additionally, seeing what has already succeeded will allow you to determine two very important things: what can be updated and what can be improved upon. This is a great place to launch a brainstorm session for new data acquisition ideas.

Industry trend and benchmark reports

Sure, this content type overlaps with “New Research and Studies,” but it merits its own section because of its specificity and high potential.

If your vertical experiences significant change from one year, quarter, or month to the next, there may be an opportunity to create recurring reports that analyze the state of your industry. This is a great opportunity to engage all different kinds of brands within your industry while also showcasing your authority in the subject.

How?

People often like to take trends and add their own commentary as to why trends are occurring or how to make the most of a new, popular strategy. That means they’ll often link to your report to provide the context.

And there’s an added promotional benefit: Once you begin regularly publishing and promoting this type of content, your industry will anticipate future releases.

Examples

HubSpot’s State of Inbound report, which features survey data from thousands of HubSpot customers, has been published annually for the last eight years. To date, the URL that hosts the report has links from 495 RDs.

Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs have teamed up for the last seven years to release two annual content marketing benchmark reports. The most recent report on B2B content marketing has earned links from 130 RDs. To gather the data, CMI and MarketingProfs emailed a survey to a sample of marketers from their own email marketing lists as well as a few lists from partner companies.

In addition to static reports, you can take this a step further and create something dynamic that is continually updated, like Indeed’s Job Trends Search (171 RDs) which pulls from their internal job listing data.

How to use this strategy

Where can you find fresh industry data? Here are a few suggestions:

Survey your customers/clients

You have a whole pool of people who have been involved in your industry, so why not ask them some questions to learn more about their thoughts, needs, fears, and experiences?

Talking directly to customers and clients is a great way to cut through speculation and discover exactly what problems they’re facing and the solutions they’re seeking.

Survey your industry

There are most likely companies in your industry that aren’t direct competitors but have a wealth of insight to provide to the overall niche.

For example, we at Fractl surveyed 1,300 publishers because we wanted to learn more about what they were looking for in content pitches. This knowledge is valuable to any content marketers involved in content promotions (including ourselves!).

Ask yourself: What aspect of your industry might need some more clarification, and who can you reach out to for more information?

Use your internal company data

This is often the easiest and most effective option. You probably have a ton of interesting data based on your interactions with customers and clients that would benefit fellow professionals in your industry.

Think about these internal data sets you have and consider how you can break it down to reveal trends in your niche while also providing actionable insights to readers.

Curated resources

Research can be one of the most time-consuming aspects of creating content. If someone has pulled together a substantial amount of information on the topic in one place, it can save anyone else writing about it a lot of time.

If you’re willing to put in the work of digging up data and examples, curated resource content may be your key to evergreen link building. Let’s look at a few common applications of this style of content.

Examples

Collections of statistics and facts

Don’t have the means to conduct your own research? Combining insightful data points from credible sources into one massive resource is also effective for long-term link attraction, especially if you keep updating your list with fresh data.

HubSpot’s marketing statistics list has attracted links from 963 root domains. For someone looking for data points to cite, a list like this can be a gold mine. This comprehensive data collection features their original data plus data from external sources. It’s regularly updated with new data, and there’s even a call-to-action at the end of the list to submit new stats.

Your list doesn’t need to be as broad as the HubSpot example, which covers a wide range of marketing topics. A curated list around a more granular topic can work, too, such as this page filled with mobile email statistics (550 RDs).

Concrete examples

Good writers help readers visualize what they’re writing about. To do this, you need to show concrete evidence of abstract ideas. As my 7th grade English teacher used to tell us: show, don’t tell.

By grouping a bunch of relevant examples in a single resource, you can save someone a lot of time when they’re in need of examples to illustrate the points they make in their writing. I can write thousands of words about the idea of 10x content, but without showing examples of what it looks like in action, you’re probably going to have a hard time understanding it. Similarly, the bulk of time it took me to create this post was spent finding concrete examples of the types of content I refer to.

The resource below showcases 50 examples of responsive design. Simple in its execution, the content features screenshots of each responsive website and a descriptive paragraph or two. It’s earned links from 184 RDs.

Authority Nutrition’s list of 20 high-protein foods has links from 53 RDs. If I’m writing a nutrition article where I mention high-protein foods, linking to this page will save me from researching and listing out a handful of protein-rich foods.

How to use this strategy

The first step is to determine what kind of information would be valuable to have all in one place for other professionals in your industry to access.

Often times, it’s the same information that would be valuable for you.

Here are some ways to brainstorm:

• Explore your recent blog posts or other on-site content. What needed a lot of explaining? What topics did you wish you had more examples to link to? Take careful note of your own content needs while tackling your own work.
• Examine comments on other industry articles and resources. What are people asking for? This is a gold mine for the needs of potential customers. You can take a similar approach on Reddit and Quora.
• What works for other industries that you can apply to your own? Search for terms like the following to see what has been successful for other niches that you can apply to yours:
  • [Industry topic] examples
  • types of [industry topic]
  • list of [Industry topic]
  • [Industry topic] statistics OR stats
  • [Industry topic] facts

No matter which way you choose to proceed, the time investment can help you garner many links down the line.

Beginner content

Every niche has a learning curve, with various words, concepts, and ideas being foreign to a beginner.

Content that teaches noobs the ins and outs of your vertical has long-term linking potential. This type of content is popular for citations because it saves the writer from explaining things in their own words. Instead, they can link to the expert’s explanation.

And the best part is you can tap your internal experts to provide great insights that can serve as the foundation for this type of content.

Examples

101 Content

Moz’s Beginner’s Guide to SEO is a master class in how comprehensive beginner-level content becomes a link magnet. Not only does the guide have backlinks from more than 1,700 RDs, it also edges out the home page as the most-trafficked page on the site, according to SEMrush.

“What is...?”

Beginner content need not be as massive and thorough as the Moz guide to be linkable. It can be as simple as defining an industry term or concept.

Moz’s meta description page, which has backlinks from 244 RDs, is a solid example of an authoritative yet simple answer to a “what is?” query.

Another example is the first result in Google for the query “what is the Paleo diet,” which has 731 links from 228 RDs. It’s not a 10,000-word academic paper about the paleo diet. Rather, it’s a concise answer to the question. This page has served as an excellent source for anyone writing about the Paleo diet within the last several years.

If a lot of adequate top-level, definition-style content already exists about topics related to your vertical, consider creating content around emerging terms and concepts that aren’t yet widely understood, but may soon be more mainstream.

The perfect example of this? Creating a definitive explanation about content marketing before the entire world knew what content marketing meant. Case in point: Content Marketing Institute’s “What is Content Marketing?” page has amassed an impressive from 12,462 links from 1,100 root domains.

How to use this strategy

Buzzsumo recently released a new tool called Bloomberry which scours forums including Reddit and Quora for questions being asked about a keyword. You can search by time period (ex. questions asked within the last 6 months, all-time results, etc.) and filter by source (ex. only see questions asked in Reddit).

Use Bloomberry to see what beginner questions are being asked about your keyword/topic. Keyword ideas include:

• [Industry topic] definition
• How does [industry topic] work
• [Industry topic] guide
• What is [industry topic]

After doing the search, ask yourself:

• What questions keep coming up?
• How are these common questions being answered?

Bloomberry is also useful for spotting research opportunities. Within the first few results for “SaaS” I found three potential research ideas.

Pro tip: Return to these threads and provide an answer plus link to your content once it’s published.

Yes, you still need to promote your content

Don’t mistake this post as a call to stop actively doing outreach and promotion to earn links. Content promotion should serve as the push that gives your content the momentum to continue earning links. After you put in the hard work of getting your content featured on reputable sites with sizable audiences, you have strong potential to organically attract more links. And the more links your content has, the easier it will be for writers and publishers in need of sources to find it.

What types of content do you think are best for earning citation links? I’d love to hear what’s worked for you – please share your experiences in the comments below.

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

from The Moz Blog http://tracking.feedpress.it/link/9375/5428622

To identify the right marketer for your business, browse these types of social media influencers

Every type of business needs a good marketing strategy. Otherwise, a business will fail to reach their maximum revenue. Finding the right marketing techniques can be a tedious process. You might need to make extensive researches or even try those strategies on a trial and error basis. However, to save you from all these time-consuming [more…]

from TheMarketingblog http://www.themarketingblog.co.uk/2017/02/which-social-media-influencer-would-fit-for-your-business/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=which-social-media-influencer-would-fit-for-your-business

Events : How to make significantly more money from your online business using clever SEM

The search marketing elite are gathering to deliver a conference that has one clear objective – to show you how to make significantly more money from your online business using clever SEM.   The Search Elite Conference has a lineup of speakers that have each led outstanding success in search marketing. If you are an in-house [more…]

from TheMarketingblog http://www.themarketingblog.co.uk/2017/02/events-how-to-make-significantly-more-money-from-your-online-business-using-clever-sem/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=events-how-to-make-significantly-more-money-from-your-online-business-using-clever-sem

Events : SEO tools that turbo charge your business … The Search Elite Conference

SEO tools that turbo charge your business. The @JudithLewis session at The Search Elite Conference will future proof your online marketing pic.twitter.com/P4KfB2UZ3k — Search Elite (@thesearchelite) February 23, 2017

from TheMarketingblog http://www.themarketingblog.co.uk/2017/02/seo-tools-that-turbo-charge-your-business-the-search-elite-conference/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=seo-tools-that-turbo-charge-your-business-the-search-elite-conference

The Do's and Don'ts of Infographic Typography [Free Guide]

The following is an excerpt from Do's and Don'ts of Infographic Design, a free guide we created with our friends at leading graphic design software company Venngage. If you'd like to access the full guide, click here.

One of the most important, but least considered parts of designing an infographic is typography. After all, picking the right fonts is exceptionally hard. Besides the fact that there are thousands of options, finding the “right” font is actually really subjective. Different designers have different fonts tastes, and any designer could any number of fonts in their designs.

Getting good at choosing the fonts for your designs is difficult, but here are a few guidelines to get you started.

The Do's and Don'ts of Infographic Typography 

DO: Stick to the primary categories of font families.

If you don’t know much about typography, here’s the biggest thing you need to know: there are three main categories of font families: serifs, sans serifs, and display fonts. Each has different purposes and common uses among designers.

Serif fonts are fonts that have small lines or embellishments attached to the letters. These embellishments are called “serifs.” Common fonts such as Times New Roman and Merriweather are examples of serifs.

How are they used? One common argument is that serif fonts should be used as body text because it’s easier to read them in large blocks of text. However, this preference mostly stems from historical precedence: we’re used to reading Times New Roman in books and white papers, therefore there is the precedence that the font type is generally “easier to read” in large bodies of text. When you’re first starting out, it’s a good idea to keep this use in mind.

 

Sans serifs are fonts that do not have small lines or embellishments attached to the ends of letters. Some of the most popular fonts in this family include Roboto, Helvetica, and Arial.

How are they used? While serif fonts are considered to be best for body text, sans serif fonts are considered to be better for section headers, captions, lists and titles in your infographic. Still, many designers on the web tend to use them for body text as well, so it’s mostly a matter of preference and trend.

Display font families are fonts that are more playful by design. The might be cursive or handwriting fonts or just funky fonts meant for specific types of design.

How are they used? Generally speaking, most designers agree that you should really only use display fonts as headers to set the mood and theme of your design. Typically, display fonts are used as a focal point in a design so that it draws the reader's eye to one spot. Some popular display fonts include Lobster, Alfa Slab One, and Unica One (see below).

When it comes to choosing fonts, there are millions of options. That said, experienced designers tend to have strong preferences for which fonts to use and which fonts not to use. If you’re not sure where to begin, try using a tool like Font Pair to get designer-recommended font groupings.

DO: Match the theme of the infographic.

The first step to picking fonts is to think about the theme or topic of your infographic. Are you trying to convey a playful or serious tone? Humorous or dark?

Then think about the audience and intent of your infographic. If the goal of your infographic is to share data, you probably want to make the infographic look more professional than cartoonish. Alternatively, if your infographic is meant for kids, it might be more appropriate to use cartoonish display fonts.

Sometimes, it helps to take a look at other infographics to grasp how you should think about thematic design.

In the example below, the author decided to use sans serif fonts throughout. The result is a very minimalist and futuristic design that correlates well with the topic: online learning.

In contrast, the creator of the next infographic used a mix of serif fonts and sans serif fonts, creating a very sleek, classic look that pairs well with the topic of cooking.

The next infographic showcases a different serif font. Through the use of bright colors and easy-to-read fonts, the infographic feels very whimsical. Could the author have used a different font family in it? Of course! The point is the font that was chosen subjectively, by the designer, to fit the theme they were aiming for.

There’s no right answer when it comes to picking fonts for your infographic. Instead, try to think about typography as a complementary element of your whole theme. Choose with purpose, not just because you like a font you see in a list somewhere.

DO: Pick a font palette & stick to it.

It’s not enough to just pick a few fonts and use them however you want. To make a well-designed infographic, it’s important to establish for yourself what sizes, weights, and fonts you're using throughout different sections. In other words, creating a font palette will keep your design consistent and improve the overall look of your infographic. Just like choosing a color palette, you need to find fonts that work together and then assign them to different parts of your infographic.

No idea where to start? Here a few tools to help:

Google Font tool: Made up of about 800 different font choices and shows you what particular fonts will pair well together.

For example:

Font Pair: This blog makes finding fonts that go well together (by font category) easy by showing you examples in action on a simple browser.

Once you have a few font options in mind, you can start creating your font palette. In general, most infographics will have about five parts to a palette.

Note: this does not mean you need five different fonts. Here’s an example of how a font palette might be broken up based on the organization of your infographic:

• Main Title
• Section Title
• Headers
• Descriptors
• Body Text

In general, you shouldn’t be using more than 2-3 different font families. Instead, use different weights and colors for different sections, but keep the fonts consistent.

In this next example, the font palette uses two different fonts with different weights and cases to create five unique parts of the palette:

Here is an example of font palette you could use to create your own hierarchy.

DO: Match fonts with icons.

Picking icons to use with your headers and fonts can be another area of difficulty for first-time designers.

When it comes to icons and fonts, great pairings can be achieved just by keeping the style consistent throughout.

For example, take a look at the infographics below:

The infographic on the left conveys a certain feel of professionalism because the strong title font contrasts with the minimalism of the icons. Additionally, all of the fonts match each other, which helps to create an organized structure. The example on the right, on the other hand, uses four different fonts that don’t have the same level of contrast with the icons.

Here’s a good rule of thumb: if your icons are minimalist, light, and thin, trying using strong fonts in contrast.

Alternatively, if you’re using bolder, fuller icons, use a minimal font in contrast. Here’s an example demonstrating that effect:

In the next example, the font icon on the left has good contrast because the icon is meant to stand out. The version on the right, however, doesn’t have the same level of contrast, making the focal point harder to navigate.

DO: Align everything.

Design alignment refers to how you place similar elements in proximity to one another. Poor element alignment makes for a poorly-designed infographic and can be distracting to the viewer.

Alignment is a part of placing every single graphic, text, header, and element on your infographic. When you’re in the design process, have a mental checklist:

• Are all of my headers aligned in the same vertical axis (left, right, center)?
• Is there the same amount of space between my headers and body text elements?
• Is there the same amount of space between my sections?
• Do my lines end and begin in the same proximity to the elements they’re placed next to?

Here is an example of how elements should be lined up for consistency and elegance:

Make sure to place the same types of elements -- body text, headers, graphics, etc. aligned in the same position relative to the other object within and outside of its section. If you have three sections with a header and body text, each header should be aligned with the other headers, and the same is true for the body text. In addition, there should be equal amount of space between the three different sections.

Here’s an example of an infographic with perfect alignment:

The reader can quickly flow from one piece of information to the other without alignment distraction.

Want to learn what not to do? Click here to access the complete guide: The Do's and Don'ts of Infographic Design.

from HubSpot Marketing Blog https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/infographic-design