If you are struggling to get the results you need from your digital marketing [online marketing], this post is for you. And yes, it features a great example from Taylor Swift.

I’d like to start with an odd question: Have you noticed that at every serious road accident, there’s always an ambulance close by?

Based on that analysis, the best way to avoid a serious road accident, is to avoid driving where there are ambulances. You should especially stay away from groups of two ambulances or more, as these seem to cause the worst accidents.

Focusing on the wrong things

Of course, that’s totally the wrong way around. However, business owners make that kind of incorrect assumption all the time. They look at successful business owners and try to emulate them. Because they read the situation incorrectly, they end up focusing on the wrong things and making bad decisions.

A key area where this is a real challenge, is regarding digital marketing / social media. Small business owners often waste a lot of time and money focusing on traffic, followers and likes. They think that if they can push those numbers up, it will significantly help their business.

So, they focus on building those numbers and get it all wrong. Allow me to explain.

How Taylor Swift gets it right

Here’s an example of the correct approach. From one of the most successful recording artists of the past decade.

Taylor Swift didn’t become an ultra successful pop star because she has tens of millions of Twitter followers.

She has 66,000,000 Twitter followers, because she’s a super-talented artist.

Taylor Swift’s fans are attracted to her, because of her work. Not because Swift was an untalented unknown, with some smart Twitter tricks.

Now, if you build a great following of connected people and a dedicated reader community, because they love your work and value your leadership, that’s wonderful. These people will be a huge benefit to your business. Just make sure you get it the right way around.

Focusing on what matters

You don’t need traffic, followers or likes.

• You need sales.
• You need to retain your clients.
• You need better clients.
• You need the trust of your marketplace.
• You need high quality leads.
• You need more referrals.
• You need better profits.

Those are the areas you should focus on. Those are the areas, which you should measure your progress by.

Here’s why

When your goal is to attract more traffic, followers or likes, it drastically changes your marketing. Here are a few very common examples.

• Your focus shifts from relationship building to list building.
• Your focus shifts from quality to quantity.
• Your focus shifts from connecting with people, to collecting people on social networks.

Build a business. Build a great story. Count what matters… and don’t be distracted by a series of worthless numbers.

This will help you: Are you building a tribe or writing drive-by content?

If you want to see a quick and measurable improvement with your marketing results, today’s post could really help you.

I’m going to share 3 areas of digital marketing, which small business owners tend to get very wrong. Here they are, in no particular order.

Invisible social networking

Social networks allow us to connect with a targeted group of people, worldwide, without leaving our desk.

Given this amazing opportunity, what does the average small business owner do? They use their commercial, social networking accounts to share famous quotes and re-share other people’s content.

This tells prospective clients nothing about what the vendor stands for. It suggest the vendor either has nothing to say or lacks the confidence to say what they think.

Operating behind an outdated website

This is an immediate turn-off. It instantly creates a terrible impression. Prospective clients can draw only 2 conclusions about businesses, who have old or nasty looking websites.

1. The business lacks the money to pay for a professional site.
2. The business is too unprofessional to care how bad they look.

Both those messages are extremely toxic… to your marketing and your reputation.

Using cheap or DIY design

A business owner sends a powerful signal, by the quality of design they use, to represent what their business stands for.

How important is good design?

A well-crafted marketing message, coupled with poor quality design, is like a beautiful meal, served on a dirty plate!

As a result, their marketing looks shoddy and unprofessional, before people even read it. It speaks louder than the marketing message.

1, 2 or 3?

Some of you will be operating behind a professional and up-to-date website, with powerful design and a super-effective social networking strategy. Well done.

Others will be making at least 1 of those errors. And some will be failing on 2 or 3 of them.

And that’s perfectly fine!

Here’s why: The investment required in order to put these errors right, is far lower than what it will cost you to allow them to carry on hurting your business.

Plus, if you get it right, you will notice measurable results extremely quickly.