Brands, It’s Time to Enter the METAVERSE. Here’s how!

Imagine a world, where a large number of people hang out together, online. Wait, don’t imagine. It’s already a reality now. Various online gaming platforms have evolved from simple tasks and challenges to a complete universe in itself. (Grand Theft Auto, we’re looking at you!)

At a time when companies like Microsoft are announcing that their number of subscribers are going over 10 million, it is quite visible that the pandemic has dashed any hope of weaning children (and adults!) from the online world.

That is the power of the metaverse.

META-WHAT?

Imagine yourself walking into a showroom with a friend and going through different products while customizing them according to your choice. Two clicks and you are out of the showroom. As soon as you take your hands off the mouse and your eyes off the screen, you are at your place sitting in your room.

THIS IS METAVERSE

A parallel virtual world that combines multiple technologies like augmented and virtual reality, videos, and 3D avatars. It creates a space where people can shop and trade but also work, travel, socialize, and interact with one another. All of this on the internet, just like they do in real life.

For a term coined three decades ago by Neal Stephenson in his sci-fi novel, Snow Crash, ‘metaverse’ sure took a long time to become a part of the mainstream discourse. Though the actualization of the metaverse can still take a few years, the aspects of it can already be seen in online game universes, like Fortnite, Roblox, Animal Crossing, and Minecraft. These video games provide the closest metaverse experience because players don’t just play games anymore, they also use it for other activities in “cyberspace”.

Brands like Nike have entered the metaverse by creating a virtual world, Nikeland on video game platform Roblox Corp, effectively becoming the first big brand that created a digital space for players to customize their avatars with special Nike products. And like Nike, other big-names are also trying their best to engage young customers while being averse to traditional advertising tactics.

Flora Fountain, one of the best logo design companies & leading branding agency in Ahmedabad is here to share some key takeaways for brands that are still mulling over why and how to navigate through this new frontier.

HOW CAN BRANDS MAP INTO THE METAVERSE?

BRAND PLACEMENT IN GAMING PLATFORMS

87% of Generation Z, 83% of millennials, and 79% of Generation X spend their time on video games on smartphones, gaming consoles. They meet their friends, select avatars and play in that elaborate digital world of games like Roblox, Minecraft and Fortnite. There is no doubt that these habits of a customer base will have a significant impact on brands. Brand placement in games can help the brands reach a very very captive audience.

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Social Listening: Why You Must Know What Customers Are Saying Online

3.6 billion in 2020 to 4.55 billion people in 2021!

No, that’s not the increase in population but the increase recorded in social media users.

4.55 billion people, or about 57.6% of the global population, today use social media.

This ginormous population is constantly interacting online, collectively creating (and bringing down) trends, fashion, memes and also brands! Whether they are B2B, B2C, B2B2C, every brand today needs to know what people are talking about them and their competitors online. They also need to know where to find these users who are talking about them, and which users to pay more attention to.

How? Through social listening.

Let one of the best digital marketing companies in India, Flora Fountain help you hit a gold mine for customer service and product development through social listening.

SOCIAL LISTENING

Social Listening is a strategy used by brands to monitor and track all the public conversations taking place on any social media platforms related to their brand or product. These conversations or mentions are analyzed for insights to evaluate customers’ feedback.

In simpler words, it helps a brand understand why, where, and how online conversations are happening, and what people think of the brand.

WHY DO BRANDS NEED IT?

Social listening can help brands understand and thrive in a dynamic industry that morphs faster than a Power Ranger.

A. BRANDS CAN LEARN ABOUT THEIR AUDIENCE & CREATE BETTER CONTENT

If a brand actively practices social listening, it can learn a lot about what its customers desire. The strategy helps the brand discover where their audience is most active and which social networks they predominantly use. Also, brands can understand what their audience wants, where their interests lie, and questions they have, based on certain topics and keywords. Knowing where your company falls behind and knowing where you exceed customer expectations will allow you to perfect the areas you’re already succeeding in and build a plan around the areas that are in need of improvement.

B. BRANDS CAN BUILD BETTER SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING CAMPAIGNS

Once brands learn the various important aspects about their audiences, this information can help build a better digital marketing campaign. Because the best digital marketing companies will always make campaigns focusing on topics that are relevant to the target audience, so they sit up and pay attention.

Social listening helps a brand uncover such relevant topics by analysing all the social conversations based upon such keywords.

C. BRANDS CAN GET A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THEIR COMPETITION

Social listening also enables a brand to get a better understanding of how audiences feel about their competitors and the industry in general. This data gives an insight into where the brand fits in the market. It might also reveal competition, direct or indirect, that the brand didn’t even know existed.

D. BRANDS CAN FIND RELEVANT SOCIAL INFLUENCERS

Finding the right influencer for a brand is not a piece of cake. But social listening helps brand identify people with a strong following on social media and other online platforms, that match their target audience. Because when the right people talk about the brand to the right audience, chances of higher sales and customer retention increases.

BUT HOW DOES ONE PRACTICE “SOCIAL LISTENING”?

Users are unafraid of sharing their opinions online. So, in order to keep up with them, a brand must listen to them. This can be done by either hiring a team or a social media agency to keep a tab on trends, or by using a specialised software or online platforms that offer social listening tools, that give businesses access to more detailed forms of information.

1) START WITH A ‘GOAL’ & KNOW WHOM TO LISTEN TO

What is it that the brand wants to achieve with promotional activities on social media? Higher sales? Explore new audiences? Improve customer retention or form a new channel of sales/revenue? Once this is clear, it becomes the GOAL of the brand.

Next, the brand must figure out where should they put their ear on. In simpler terms, a brand should know which platforms they need to pay attention to. Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Google searches, LinkedIn, etc.

Thirdly, how to identify these conversations. Through direct mentions of the brand, social media handles, and/or product names, hashtags, campaign names and relevant keywords, names of important people in the company, topics related to the brand. And all these points to study the competitors as well.

A great example of it is the following post, where Starbucks was not tagged with its official twitter handle, yet the brand was able to identify it online thanks social listening and respond to it, thus improving their customer engagement.

2) EMPATHIZE WITH THE AUDIENCE & RESPOND FAST

The audience needs to feel that they are being heard.

And in order to do that, the brand needs to engage a little more with its audience. Be it negative or positive, the brand needs to empathize with the audience.

If a brand gets positive feedback, then it needs to figure out what the audience loved about it and build marketing campaigns on that basis. And if the brand gets negative feedback, it needs to know the pain point of the audience in order to solve it.

3) CHOOSE THE RIGHT LISTENING TOOLS!

As kids, everyone is taught how active listening is important, but when it comes to brands, they haven’t always had the right tools to do so at a large scale. But now, there are many that can help brands in collecting and analyzing data in an easier way. Here are some that work across major social media networks:

Sprout Social:

This tool provides brands with in-depth analytics and insights for organised social listening. One of its features shows the hashtags and topics that are trending across the mentions of the brand and replies on behalf of the connected brand. The name of the people and brands that most frequently talk about and get mentioned with a particular brand surfaces on the tool.

Hootsuite:

Brands can use this tool to monitor conversations, keywords, mentions, along with hashtags and respond to them. The tool helps a brand to analyse many real-time conversations taking place on digital platforms.

HubSpot:

Brands can monitor social interactions and connect with the right people. It allows a brand to link data from social media with contacts in their database in order to create custom keyword monitoring, email alerts, mention notifications, etc.

Other than these, there are tools like Lately, Brand24, Brandwatch, Buffer, TweetDeck, Mention, which come with comprehensive features to help brands collect brand mentions across major social media networks.

As one of the top full-service digital agencies, Flora Fountain provides digital marketing services in Ahmedabad, India and across the world. Drop us a message to plan some insightful social listening strategies for your brand.

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5 Simple Hacks to Wiggle Your Way Out Of a Creative Block

There’s a cup of coffee on a table, it seems to have gone cold ages ago. While the room is dimly lit, the bright light from the laptop screen breaks the monotony of the room. And right there, in front of that screen, on a chair is a person sitting and staring blankly at the empty document file open on the screen, wondering where to start.

Every creative person has come across scenarios where he or she feels saturated when it comes to fresh ideas. They’re unable to find the motivation to look at things differently or take inspiration from what’s going around them and create something unique and valuable.

This invisible barrier is called a Mental Block. No, it’s not a disorder to be diagnosed or medically treated. It happens to the best of us. But it could be overcome. How? Let the writer of this piece, from the best creative agency in Ahmedabad, tell you. Yes, we’re speaking from experience.

REMEMBER WHY YOU STARTED IN THE FIRST PLACE

That feeling of not being creative enough has prevented many artists, creators and writers from taking that plunge, of exploring that little idea, that thought nugget, which could be developed into a work of art. This is self-doubt at play.

Despite having numerous awards, recognitions, degrees and all that jazz, when self-doubt creeps in, it makes a person feel unqualified to do even the simplest tasks of the job. It affects his/her productivity and further stems the creative growth trajectory.

It could originate from that one rejection of an idea, a blunder or an error that may have been minor, but it makes one feel embarrassed and guilty. But, but… There’s a way out.

Sometimes, taking a walk back in the memory lane can rejig and remind us of the core idea behind everything we do. Why did you become a writer? What made you decide that you wanted to be a designer? What inspired you to take up teaching, accounting, athletics or whatever discipline you are into?

Being reminded of the original goals infuses fresh energy and a serotonin boost, to get up and pull up those sleeves to get started, take that first step.

OVERCOME THOSE EMOTIONAL ROADBLOCKS

It’s not always the professional challenges that stops someone from expressing their thoughts and ideas freely. Sometimes, certain incidents or situations on a personal front could be creating an emotional roadblock to the flow of creativity.

Having worked and interacted with many creative minds and being one of the best advertising agencies in Ahmedabad, we have come across scenarios where writers aren’t able to express themselves in their usual selves, the designers seem to get their senses wrong one that one particular day. It is only upon talking to them, we realised that one had a tiff with their wife in the morning, someone else found out about some disorder or disease they have, another person got scolded by their parents for something.

Yes, these incidents and scenarios affect a person emotionally and mentally. It can block out everything else around them and make them keep thinking about this one thing all the time. While there is no practical way out, given everyone has varying emotional bandwidth. Taking a break, to grieve, to procrastinate; or talking to a confidante about it, helps one feel better, lighter and safer. And that way, you’re able to find room to think about things other than this.

BE MORE FLEXIBLE

While working on a project, sometimes you might feel like there is only one way to solve it. On your way to find that ‘right’ answer you fail to see any other options or alternatives. You start resisting considering those options without properly evaluating those alternatives.

Remember, flexibility comes hand in hand with creativity. So instead of trying to find the right answer, give yourself an assignment and spend enough time to fairly judge all other options. Take a break from being unique in every creative, and do a repetitive task in which you know you are good.

Just let your mind wander!

STOP OVERTHINKING

When your inner critic is hyperactive and finds fault in every idea you have. You eventually stop yourself from trying any of your ideas. This means, your brain gets in the way of your creativity, and you’re overthinking everything. Making too many assumptions is restricting in discovering new innovative options or approaches to a problem or a specific situation. Be quick to discard any assumptions that are not based on solid facts or there isn’t sufficient proof to back these assumptions up.

To get out of overthinking, the first thing you have to do is get out of your head! Clear your mind by going out for a walk in the park, or by watching your favourite movie, or reading a book.

DON’T RUN AWAY FROM RISKS, TACKLE THEM

Yes, we know it sounds a bit tough given the pickle you’re already in, but trust us, this is the best way out. Everyone fears making mistakes, failing at something and facing its consequences. But then that limits the scope of where your creativity takes you and how your intellect evolves.

Sidestepping a challenging scenario means you are undermining your capabilities. Instead, test them. It’s never a life and death situation (unless you’re held captive for ransom). If you’re able to overcome the challenge, you will revel in its success. And if you struggle in doing so, you will learn many lessons for the future.

Because it was this fear of facing those struggles that were blocking your mind from taking that plunge.

ALWAYS REMEMBER, these creative blocks are just a part of the creative process and of agency life. We hope these simple but mindful hacks from Flora Fountain, one of the best advertising agencies & creative agencies in Ahmedabad, come to rescue the next you run into a wall we call the creative block. And if that doesn’t work, just give us a call 🙂

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Designing a Logo? Don’t Forget To Include These…

So you want to make your customers sit up and take notice, maybe do a little dance of joy and discovery too? So you want to let them know your brand’s story, how different it is from all the competition out there? After all, in the 90s, there were lover boys and then there was Shakhrukh aka Rahul.

Enter BRAND LOGO

And just like in the movies, brand love does happen at first sight. And logos, being the metaphorical face of a brand, are often carriers of the brand’s first impression for new and future audiences. Logos are also a great way to distinguish your brand from other companies with similar products. So let’s dig a little deeper with the experts from one of Ahmedabad’s best-known logo design and branding agencies to find out all that a logo can be and should be…

Brand or pictorial mark

Made up of a graphic symbol or icon which represents a real-world object. A perfect example would be, Apple.

Abstract

Logos which consist of a unique symbol tailor-made for the brand, like the one for Pepsi.

Mascots

These logos are made of images of a character that act as a visual representation of the business, like Colonel Sanders in the KFC logo.

Emblem

Logos which consist of a typeface that sits within a border or a seal. For example, Starbucks.

Dynamic

These are adaptable logos, which change themselves according to the context in which they are being used, instead of having a standard font-color-text combination.

Wordmark

These logos consist of text only with company names, monograms or initials. Think Subway or Coca Cola.

Knowing the whole gamut of logo options, how does one choose which logo style works best for your business? Well, here’s how…

1. DO EXTENSIVE RESEARCH

You have only one chance to get the logo right! So, do it properly! And how can you do it? With the help of thorough research. Good research will show how you can explore different logos to create a perfect one for your brand.

Dig deep and research your competitors’ logos as well. Don’t do it, to copy from them, but rather to check what kind of design, scheme and layout they have. See what worked and what didn’t work for them. And with the help of your research.

You should show customers that you are unique and different. Plus, being too close to your competitors could be detrimental, and get you into legal trouble. Moreover, be clear of your audience and find out what colours or concepts work on them.

After your research, create a brand concept that reflects the ethos and goals of the brand.

2. ALWAYS HAVE A STORY

Have you ever seen a big brand without a logo? No, because there isn’t one. Logo tells the story of the brand. And you need to create that story too.

When consumers see any brand logo, they are reminded of the stories of the businesses those logos represent. For example, when people see an iconic Golden Arches, they know it’s McDonald’s. It is a brand which people recognise without even seeing the name. The arches represent the newly-constructed architecture of the first franchised restaurant in 1952. Did you see? A story!

This is how companies which have logos connected to the company’s stories or mission are often the most successful.

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5 Nightmares Every Web Developer Dreads

While everyone and their aunt talks about things developers dig, what coders love to create and so on, we are surprised how nobody is talking about what developers love to hate, the coding horrors that give them nightmares.

With a team of sharp web developers working on some of the best websites designed and developed in Ahmedabad India, we have learnt at close quarters about the many things that keep our talented techies up at night, things they dread. And they are…

1. FIXING SOMEONE ELSE’S BAD CODE AND BUGS

The one thing that every developer fears while joining a new company, is the cleanup job of any project developed by someone else. Developers hate touching someone else’s code. And it’s a horror story if the code they’re working on is lengthy, unreadable, complex, riddled with bugs and LIVE.

Wondering why this happens so often? That’s because developers, just like writers and painters, have their own style of coding. A good developer will always document his/her code, to ensure the sanity of anyone who might have to work on their code in future. Yes, this includes themselves too.

Of course documentation is a painful process and it’s the second most hated thing for most developers, but without it, any new developer will have to scour through thousands of lines of the original code to figure out what the former developer was thinking. And trust us, it is a NIGHTMARE!

2. THIS, THAT, EVERYTHING IS A TOP PRIORITY!

Three developers walk into a bar, they start discussing their priority tasks and bugs. The bartender chipped in, “I KNOW, RIGHT… THAT’S WHY I CHOSE BARTENDING OVER CODING!”

Developers absolutely hate it when their project managers come up to them and keep adding new “top-priority” tasks on their plate and still expect them to complete all the previously ongoing ones at the end of the day.Prioritizing means ranking tasks on the basis of its importance and urgency. It’s not rocket science for anyone to not get it. Of the many developers we have worked with while offering website development and web design services in Ahmedabad, most of us have recalled of instances where they have been expected to work on two projects in parallel or multitask because Task A and Task B both are ‘Top Priority’

Surprise, surprise, that’s not how it is supposed to work! It’s just a pure case of bad management and project heads and team leads cannot blame their developers for their poor estimation of deadlines.

3. MEETINGS, A LOT OF THEM!

THIS MEETING COULD HAVE BEEN AN EMAIL!

Developers absolutely hate it when they are pulled into “quick meetings” that last close to an hour and have no clear objective or agenda. This causes interruptions in the flow of their work and forces them to clock extra hours in the office to finish their work for their “Top Priority” projects.

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Advertising on Social Media: Why You Need a Separate Game Plan

Who would have thought that the platforms created to let people share stories from their lives through pictures and videos would turn out to be such great tools for audiences to discover new products and services and for brands to find these new audiences. And the pandemic has only made it more so!

It is time to go deeper into the social media rabbit hole.

Social media marketing and social media advertising. Always knew they were different, but didn’t know who to ask? Read below for some insights from Ahmedabad’s best digital marketing agency!

First things first, social media marketing is purely organic activity, which involves posting pictures, publishing stories, responding to comments and inquiries on messages and sharing the posts in various groups and communication channels.

While social media advertising comprises all paid marketing activity on various social media platforms through the means of sponsored posts and boosts, done over and above the usual social media marketing activity such as posting and creating stories.

While there is an overlap between the two in terms of results and goals, advertising on social media is a different ball game altogether, with targeted budgets, a keener understanding of target audiences, and a smart selection of the content that should be boosted.

Because of the difference in strategy and skills required for the two, the top advertising agency in Ahmedabad suggests that a mere social media strategy or calendar does not cut it for a brand. Serious brands must have a separate game plan for the two. Read on to know why and everything else about social media advertising.

WHY ADVERTISE ON SOCIAL MEDIA

Social media advertising is an all-encompassing format of marketing for a brand. Since social media is a place where the people are a bit chilled out, it gives marketers the opportunity to go out of their way with creativity to make their brand stand out.

The regular advertising in the digital world includes the usual suspects, like pay-per-click ads, website display ads, video popup ads, digital billboards, etc. But social media has promotions and boosts, which offers them great flexibility in tweaking the audience, its reach perimeter, the budgets, and putting a pause or restart as per the brands requirements.

Even the best digital marketing agencies in India believe that organic reach is hard to achieve, hence if a brand has the bandwidth and resources to spend, they must consider social media advertising for quick win and turn around.

HOW TO ADVERTISE ON SOCIAL MEDIA

Different platforms have different ways to let businesses and individuals promote themselves and their services to a large swathe of potential customers with interests that align with what they sell.

Listed below are the various kinds of paid promotions a brand can run on different platforms.

TWITTER PROMOTIONS

With Twitter Promote, the Twitter algorithm automatically promotes Tweets to the brand’s specified audience. It promotes the first 10 daily organic Tweets that pass the Twitter quality filter. It also promotes the brand account to attract new followers.

Marketeers can focus on up to 5 interests or metro locations, and let Twitter do the rest. Unfortunately, with this feature, marketers can’t choose which Tweets to promote. (That’s why creating great content on a regular basis for every platform is important).

FACEBOOK ADS

With over 2.45 billion monthly active users, Facebook is popular across many demographics. Just as many teenagers use Facebook as their parents—and seniors are quickly catching up. With ads, brands can direct users to its Facebook Page or the website as a part of the sales funnel. One such great form of advertising is Carousel ads on Facebook timelines.

Carousel ads work well to showcase different features of a product, or to explain a step-by-step process. They’re also a great way to present multiple products or services.

Sometimes, brands can showcase a variety of products in a single carousel chain, and every picture can have a customised purchase or inquiry link. This way, it can not only be a great sales and data collection tool too.

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Content Marketing Vs Content Writing: It’s Different!

EVERYTHING is CONTENT!

The 50 billion pictures on Instagram, the 500 hours of videos uploaded on YouTube every minute and the 7.5 million blog posts published on the internet. But many still believe content is just writing, thereby mixing up the ideas of Content Marketing and Content Writing.

As a content marketing agency in Ahmedabad, Flora Fountain has had days where their writers and digital marketers had to explain the difference between the two ideas to almost every person (even clients) that they meet.

So, here’s all the tea, to understand what exactly is content, and the difference between content writing and content marketing.

CONTENT

Content is information, art, ideas and experiences, expressed in the form of words, pictures, speech, graphics or moving visuals published either digitally or on print, for an end user to consume.

Okay, okay… Let’s try putting it in simpler words, shall we?

All kinds of photographs, blogs, articles, captions, ad copies, videos, reels, music, podcasts, graphic design or animated visuals are content.

And the internet is an ever flowing stream of content, good, bad and ugly!

CONTENT WRITING

Content writing is all about putting ideas into words, creatively and in a simpler form. Writing content can be something like an advertisement copy of just 5 words, or a thesis of 5000 words. And in digital marketing, some of the best content writing companies produce written content in the form of captions for social media posts, marketing copies for online promotions, content for websites, blogs like this, articles for newspapers and magazines, copies for print ads in magazines or hoardings, or even scripts for videos.

Content writers include bloggers, brand journalists, copywriters, ghost-writers, SEO writers, technical writers, etc.

CONTENT MARKETING

Content marketing is basically marketing to strategically promote a brand or business on a digital platform, using smartly created content like blogs, pictures, creative posters and videos.

IT IS NOT JUST WRITTEN COPY! But yes, written content does play a crucial role in content marketing, as every great marketing idea first comes to life in the form of a copy.

Content marketing is done through blogs, case studies, emailers, social media posts, video, website content, articles, ad copies, infographics and a lot more.

To sum up, Content Writing involves creating various types of written products, which can then be used to produce other forms of content and further implemented into Content Marketing to promote a business or a brand.

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How to Turn Blog Traffic into Sales on Your Ecommerce Website

The first-ever blog on the internet is believed to have appeared in 1994, and as of 2020, the Growth Badger reported that there were over 600 million blogs globally. Over 60% of internet users engage with some of the other kinds of blogs daily and an average person spends up to 37 seconds reading a blog.

Yes, every figure mentioned here is true and shows how important it is to publish blogs regularly to draw traffic to a website. And when the website in question is an ecommerce platform, there are surefire ways to convert this blog traffic into sales. And 86% of companies produce blog content compared to other formats.

Flora Fountain, an ecommerce website development and design company in Ahmedabad, India has compiled a list of to-dos and tips on how to convert the website traffic from the blogs into leads and paying customers.

PLAN THE SALES FUNNEL

A sales funnel the path a visitor on the website takes, from reading the blog to eventually purchasing the product. If there is not sales funnel planned out for every blog being published on the website, then it is nothing but just some reading material for the website visitor.

Ideally, this is how a Sales Funnel Looks like:

Visitors – Blog Post – Call to Action – Landing Page – Thank You page or pop-up

Now, these visitors can be people who directly clicked and reached the blog, or got drawn to it through other means like social media. From these blog posts, the visitors are prompted to engage with the website through strategically placed Call to Action (CTA) links and buttons. These CTAs can be either a data collection module or a link that leads to a product page. Once the customer makes the purchase or provides his/her data, they are greeted with a Thank You page or a pop-up. This link of sales funnel helps the blogs to be utilised to its full potential.

CREATE VALUABLE CONTENT THAT THE CUSTOMERS WANT

One of the best ways to convert visitors into a regular readers and eventually, paying customers of the business, is by providing them with content that addresses their pain-points, solves their problems and gives something worth the 5 minutes spent reading the blog.

Ahmedabad-based ethnic fashion brand Ray Ethnic writes blogs which provide their readers with tips and styling tricks for various seasons and occasions, and smartly plugs their products within their content.

This way, the chances of their regular blog readers clicking on the call to action links smartly embedded in the images and on the names of their outfits are increased. These links lead to their product pages with an option to buy online. Check out their blogs here.

ENSURE THAT THE BLOG IS READABLE AND ACCESSIBLE ON ALL TYPES OF DEVICES

According to a Statista report, in the year 2020, close to 4.28 billion people were accessing the internet using their mobile phones. And it will take hardly 2 seconds for any of this user to abandon a website or a link if it doesn’t open properly on their handheld devices.

Hence, it is necessary to have a responsive ecommerce website in the first place, one which opens seamlessly and runs smoothly on all kinds of mobile devices and browsers too. Secondly, the blogs shouldn’t be too long, otherwise the reader will abandon the blog halfway and leave the sales funnel.

Ideally, a blog should be of minimum 800 words. Because it contains enough word-space plus at least 5 products in it, it takes hardly 3 minutes to read a blog of this size, and that it can be optimized for SEO with the right keywords too.

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Here’s How to Retain SEO Ranking Even after a Website Redesign

SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) Rankings are sensitive and are prone to changing every time there is a change in the design or content of the website without planning for SEO. During a website redesign or redevelopment, there is a high risk of the website losing its organic traffic, rankings and sales.

While there are plenty of blogs and conversation online revolving around how to make a website rank higher up on the search engine results pages (SERP), very few talk specifically about maintaining those rankings, even in the event of a redesign on the website. So, let’s talk about retaining a website’s rankings on the SERP after a redesign on the site and look at some of the tips shared by the SEO experts at Flora Fountain, a digital agency offering SEO Services in Ahmedabad.

SAVE THE ORIGINAL WEBSITE’S DATA FIRST

One of the ways to ensure website’s rankings don’t suffer heavily is by maintaining a similarity in the flow of content and design of the old site. Because search engines rank those pages or websites higher that are easy to navigate. It is important to save the old or current website’s data, i.e. a list of all the pages, its URLs, important pieces of content, keywords and the sitemap for future reference. It helps the developers and designers to ensure the user experience doesn’t get disturbed on the redesigned website.

DON’T MAKE CHANGES ON THE LIVE SITE

This is an important point to remember. While making changes or during the redesigning process, the website must be disabled. The updated version should be made live only after testing. But disabling a website means the business will lose many customers and visitors who might be trying to access the site. It is advised to do it on a different domain. Experts providing top SEO services in India suggest that all the changes and updates should be made in a different domain or a staging site, and once all the changes provide satisfactory results in testing, only then the new site be swapped with the old one live on the internet.

USE 301 REDIRECTS

When there is a change in the URLs, make sure to have 301 Redirects for them. The 301 Redirects notifies the search engines that the content has been shifted to a new location and takes the visitors to the new web page from the old one.

A broken link can damage the ranking of the website, which will eventually lead to losing organic traffic to the website. This happens because the search engine assigns the existing ranking to the new page only after it knows that both the pages have the same content in them.

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Building the Perfect Website Is a Collaboration Between Design and Development

A website is a great tool for digital marketing, selling online and for building credibility for a business. But an average user spends hardly 15 seconds on a website. In order to make them stay longer and engage with the website, the website must be visually pleasing and easy to interact with.

It is a collaboration between great design and robust development that creates a smashing website. Here’s a look at how Flora Fountain, the best website development and design agency in Ahmedabad works to create the perfect website for its brands and businesses

But first, let’s understand what web design and web development is.

Web Design

Website Design or Web Design refers to designing everything from the user experience to the user interface, basically all the visual elements of the website and their usability from the perspective of a user. Web designers focus on designing the front-end of the website, the part which the users get to see on the internet and interact with.

They recreate the visual ideas by creating the 1. wireframes showing the layout of the website 2. creating styleguides detailing the details of the visual elements such as fonts, buttons, text treatment for different sections and so on 3. defining the interactive elements that might need to be animated. For responsive design, designers end up creating separate layout for mobile and desktop.  Once done, they work with developers to get their vision executed and tested in code.

As a web design agency in Ahmedabad, design is at the forefront of every website we create, after all, a website is the face of every brand on digital.

Web Development

Web development or website development team usually consists of front-end and backend developers who write code that brings the wireframes to life as a working website. The front-end team code in browser-based client-side technologies like HTML, CSS, Javascript to creating what the visitors will see when they open the website in a browser, while the backend team works in server-side programming languages like PHP, Nodejs, Python, Ruby to ensure that the business logic and the functionality of any features being planned for the website are fully incorporated.

So, how does design & development work together?

1. Getting the Requirements

Information gathering is the first and foremost activity that takes place to build a website from scratch. The product owner (or manager) with the help of design, content and technology teams defines the purpose of the website, the target audience, the requirements from the client and the users for this website, and the kind of content and functionality that will be made available to the end user.

2. Creating an Information Architecture or Sitemap

With the requirements in place, now it’s time to decide what goes where and how. This exercise is ideally done by the product owner in tandem with the content team. Together they flesh out the pages required on the website and the information hierarchy or flow required to show all the information required as per the original brief.

3. Creating the Wireframe & Styleguide

A website wireframe comprises of the skeletal framework required for each page of the website. Together with the styleguide, this is the blueprint of the website. Creating the wireframes can be as simple as sketching on paper, or they can be created professionally using tools like Sketch, InVision, Adobe XD or Figma

For getting your websites wireframe made professionally, you can always contact us.

4. Building the first mocks

A mock is the working, visual replica or prototype of the website created keeping in mind the user interface of the site. While usually having a wireframe and style guide is enough, for more complicated designs, a detailed mock with each element, pictures and sample content is sometimes required. This mock gives an idea on how all the elements will come together on a page, and is useful for getting feedback from the client, before beginning coding. For responsive websites, separated mockups for desktop, mobile and even tablets might be required.

Custom website design through mockups is one of Flora Fountain’s core strengths as a website development agency.

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5 most common Digital marketing myths busted

“I have a small business; I don’t have to do digital marketing right now”

“Email marketing? Does it even work today?”

These are some of the most commonly used rebuttals by entrepreneurs when they are asked to hire a digital marketing agency for their businesses. Now, they either don’t know what digital marketing is, or have heard and believe in the various misconceptions around it.

But, what are these misconceptions about digital marketing, and how are they detrimental to businesses, if not busted? Read on to know the 8 most common digital marketing myths.

1. DIGITAL MARKETING IS ONLY FOR BIG BUSINESSES

Digital Marketing provides all businesses, big or small, with equal opportunities on the internet. With a well-researched and proven digital marketing strategy, small businesses can compete with big brands online, allowing it to reach a wider audience despite having a standard marketing budget for it. A Forrester study states that post pandemic, businesses should ideally spend around 46% of their total marketing budget on digital marketing now.

In today’s day and age, digital marketing is an indispensable strategy for every business no matter what size it is. Because whether it is a smartphone or a roll of toilet paper, people are now looking for them online first.

2. NO NEED TO INVEST IN SOCIAL MEDIA

One of the biggest mistakes a business can make in today’s time is to believe that their customers aren’t on social media. According to a study on Statista, over 3.6 billion people were using social media worldwide in the year 2020. These numbers are projected to jump to almost 4.41 billion in 2025.

Having a presence on social media gives businesses the opportunity to promote their products or services to their ideal customer base directly, interact with them more, stay on track with the trends and even sell through these platforms. The possibilities to attract potential customers and generate leads through targeted ads on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram are endless.

3. DO IT, ONLY IF YOUR COMPETITION IS DOING IT

Now, let us make it very simple here. If your competitors are doing digital marketing, then you should do it too. But, if none of your competitors are online, be the first one to be. Grab that first mover’s advantage and make hay as the sun shines bright.

A brand should stay ahead of the curve when it comes to digital marketing, as not going digital means missing out on a whole new world of new customers a brand can reach. And digital marketing is not just promoting products and services on social media. It includes, email marketing, targeted digital ads, SEO and much more.

Here’s a sneak peek into the various activities done by Flora Fountain, a digital marketing company in Ahmedabad India.

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Captions That Captivate! 8 Tips to Write for Social Media

What attracts the attention of the viewer on social media?

• A beautiful visual
• A good photograph
• A stunning design

But what results in an interaction on the post, a LIKE, a COMMENT, a DM (direct message) or a link click?

A captivating caption, something that delights the reader, generates curiosity in them, convinces them to read further and take action.

While sharing photos or creatives on social media, a well-written caption will set the tone for the post, inspire your followers, give value, spark discussion, and demonstrate the brand`s personality.

And here are some suggestions for creating a compelling caption and improving a brand`s social media marketing approach.

FIRST IMPRESSION IS WHAT LASTS!

With people`s attention spans shrinking, a strong opening line will help you grab their attention. While you have the entire text box to narrate a story about the post, it is the first 50 characters that matter. Especially on Instagram, because people are going to click on the “Read more…” call out only if the first line leaves them intrigued and wanting for more.

Your captions should be a natural extension of your post. There must be a strong connection between the image and the caption. Never let a post get published without a copy or simply repeat what is written in the image copy, as your caption. A repetitive copy is as useless as a post with no caption.

FULFILL THE INTENTION

Your captions must fulfill the purpose behind the post. Before you write a caption, ask these questions to yourself: Are you trying to establish a connection with the target audience? Do you want them to take action after reading your caption? or are you simply showing off the brand`s personality through the writing.

If it is an action post, make sure you make it clear in the second or third line of your caption on what the reader needs to do.

“Click on the link in bio”

“Call 123456789 to know more”

“Share your thoughts in the comments below”

These are some examples of Call To Action phrases to be used in captions.

GET THEM TALKING!

Create social media captions that elicit feedback and encourage your audience to comment on your post.

One of the simplest ways to increase the number of comments on your post is to ask a question. The questions don`t have to be difficult; they should be basic and simple.

Inviting your audience to submit their tips, reviews, and recommendations is a fantastic method to engage them. Because trust us, your users will not respond to you unless you ask them to.

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Increase your online sales through these ecommerce marketing strategies

Marketing plays an important role in driving sales for a business, whether they are offline or online. But the strategies that drive traffic to ecommerce platforms and further convert them into sales are completely different from traditional practices.

Here’s a look into some interesting and proven ecommerce strategies that can help brands sell more through their ecommerce websites. You’re welcome!

CROSS SELLING

One of the most effective ways to increase the cart value of the customer is to cross sell. Cross selling means selling a different product to the customer, either as an alternative or an addition to the product that’s already added to the cart. Ecommerce websites like Myntra and Amazon usually have a section called “Frequently Bought Together” where they show combos of products that complement each other.

Amazon.in cross selling multiple shirts on their product page

For instance, if a customer is looking to purchase a mobile phone online and as they scroll down, it will show a combined price window with a pair of earphones and power bank. It lures the customers into thinking he/she is getting a great deal in purchasing all of three products together.

BUILD UP A SENSE OF URGENCY

Another great ecommerce marketing strategy to encourage customers to purchase a product is by creating a sense of urgency in their minds, of missing out on buying the said product if they don’t act now or. The idea is to offer the customer a short window to make the decision and have a feeling of getting a great deal out of it.

There are various ways to do it. One of the most commonly practiced methods is to entice them by showing the quickly running out stock levels. When a customer sees that the product they just liked might go out of stock soon, chances are, he/she will end up buying it.

Rayethnic.com creating a sense of urgency by highlighting high demand of their products

Another way to create a sense of urgency is to offer a limited period discount or benefit. For instance, Amazon displays a pop-up under many of its products which offers either an attractive price deduction or a free overnight shipping if the customer places an order within X number of hours.

BLOGS

Now, this is a long-term strategy which requires quality content and consistency over a period of time, but the benefits are many. Blogging is an effective and proven strategy used by major ecommerce marketing companies in India.

But, how do blogs help?

Blogs are among the best ways to boost an ecommerce website’s organic SEO reach. Blogs give businesses a channel to engage with their regular customers through well written blogs that offer value to them. Just like how Ray Ethnic does with their blogs. They offer fashion tips and product suggestions and promote ethnic fashion through their well written articles.

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You MUST outsource your digital marketing. Here’s why.

Marketing is the most crucial cog in the wheel for a business to move forward and grow. Often companies might think hiring a graphic designer and content writer is all it takes to start marketing on digital, but it is a special kind of beast which requires a team of experts with some very special skills to tame it. A graphic designer or a traditional marketing executive usually does not understand the intricate details and trends of social media presence, engagement, search engine optimization, digital campaigns, and the website design and development required to support it.

For mid-sized businesses, this is where outsourcing comes to your rescue. Instead of setting up an entire team of digital marketers — graphic designers, UI experts, content writers, social media analysts — and paying them hefty salaries, businesses can easily hire digital marketing agencies with in-depth expertise across digital platforms. Still wondering if it’s the right move? Read on to know the benefits you’ll reap by outsourcing your digital marketing activities.

TRUST THE EXPERTS

Outsourcing is smartsourcing, especially when it comes to digital marketing. When you hire a digital marketing agency, you get a specialist team of digital marketing experts like search engine optimization (SEO) experts, social media managers, digital content writers, UI designers, Pay-Per-Click campaign experts, web developers, and data analysts. Not only that, most agencies have platform-specific experts for Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, LinkedIn, and Twitter marketing. Agencies also have specialization based on whether you are marketing directly to end consumers, B2C, or to other businesses, B2B. They help you in all aspects of social media marketing, content marketing, email marketing, ecommerce, SEO, Search Engine Marketing (SEM), and Data Analytics, based on your business goals.

This way, you can focus more on growing your business and your digital marketing agency can ensure brand awareness, engagement, leads, and loyalty across digital platforms.

DIGITAL WITHOUT BORDERS

The internet has no boundaries. You could be a premium tea vendor based out of Assam, India or a staffing agency in New York, United States, but your business can be marketed globally by a digital marketing agency in Ahmedabad, India. Infact, both of these examples happen to be clients of our digital agency Flora Fountain! 🙂

Instead of being forced to recruit digital marketing executives in their city, businesses can hire digital agencies with the best experience in their particular segment whether it is jewellery, fashion, food, or lifestyle. And since all the communication and assets used in digital marketing can freely move through digital mediums like emails, messengers, and office suites, it is a smart and reasonable choice.

Say goodbye to long commutes to even longer meetings around conference tables to discuss every next move. Times are fast and you must be too. Hello digital!

EASIER ACCESS TO YOUR AUDIENCE

A study by Sprout Social says that customers feel more connected to a brand, if it has a strong social media presence. And on the internet, feedback is faster. Customers can reach out to brands directly on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram and leave reviews on platforms like Google Business, Facebook, Zomato, Trip Advisor, Make My Trip, etc. This gives brands an opportunity to really hear what their end-user has to say, make them feel heard with quick response and/or solutions to any challenge. In this way improving the customer experience and solidifying brand loyalty.

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Turning businesses into brands: The case for a professional creative agency

Any marketing agency out there can design hoardings, create logos or manage social media.

But what differentiates a brand from business?

Hard-to-miss presence in the market, on-point messaging to its exact audience and a knowledge of the brand even outside its demographic. These are the hallmarks of a brand. And this magic happens when a creative agency comes into the picture.

So how does a professional creative agency turn a business into a brand? Read on to know…

TEAM OF CREATIVE GENIUSES

From researching to strategizing, designing to writing, and planning to executing; a creative agency has experienced professionals working on every aspect of your business. They use their learnings from working with multiple brands to understand the market and create an effective strategy for the business to succeed.

IT IS COST EFFECTIVE

With a creative agency on board, businesses can get their branding and promotional work done for a fraction of the cost of hiring an entire team of professionals in-house. Think about it. There is a huge expense in acquiring the required tools and softwares. Then there’s the cost of paying salaries to writers, designers, strategists, and consultants. This will drive the cost per lead up through the roof!

GET A FRESH PERSPECTIVE

Sometimes the best way to sustain customer interest and attract a new audience for the brand is by introducing newness; in the brand communication, the product range and the promotional activities.

And this is where a creative agency comes to your rescue. A creative agency in India like Flora Fountain looks at the brand from a neutral perspective, sometimes even from a consumer’s viewpoint. It then identifies the challenges that the brand might be facing. Such as product acceptance, brand communication, the brand’s central idea getting lost or even customer service and feedback.

A creative agency thinks outside the box and comes up with new ideas, and creates innovative solutions to solve problems and delight the target audience.

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HOW COLOURS ARE THE SILENT AMBASSADORS FOR YOUR BRAND

There are so many instances where one sees a colour and associates it with or recognises the brand. The colours not only help bring out the personality of the brand but it also helps evoke an emotional connection. It attracts people and lets them know more about you. Whether you are starting or expanding your company, here are some key points you should have in mind.

THE RIGHT COLOUR MATTERS!

Call it colour psychology, but according to research, customers will make a subconscious decision based on colours. One has to choose their brand and logo colour wisely and see what message they deliver indirectly. The colours represent the brand personality which can range from being feminine or masculine, playful or serious, modern or classic, loud or subdues etc. The colours attract customers to choose you. For example-

The famous Starbucks, with its green colour makes it look rich, welcoming, friendly, and healthy. A lot is translated about their coffee and services.

Dark blue is heavily seen in a lot of motor and technology brands. The corporates love it but don’t forget the medical and healthcare industry which uses light blue. It is a safe colour as research shows that a lot of people’s favourite colour is blue.

One can never forget to mention McDonald’s. The yellow catches the eye immediately and is visible clearly in daylight while the red is an active colour. Well, yellow is also related to happiness. You can spot other food brands too using red in their logos. Your colours communicate what you stand for. Knowing what the colour denotes in different cultures and places is important.

HOW TO CHOOSE THE RIGHT COLOURS?

After you have decided on what your brand wants to emote and what your personality is, you have to decide on the background, base and accent colour. Looks like a lot, but it’s not. Consider this a method for you to arrive at the right colours for your brand. With a wide range of colour options, your brand requires the right shade. Hence, deciding on the background, base and accent colour is important.

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WHY YOUR E-COMMERCE WEBSITE NEEDS SMASHING PICTURES

A PICTURE IS WORTH OVER A THOUSAND WORDS

Every time you’re online looking to purchase something, what is the first thing that catches your eye and convinces you to click on it. The PICTURE, right?

It is only after you’ve seen the picture and your mind is convinced in the first few seconds that this seems to be a good product, is when you then move on to read a little bit about it, maybe on the title, the description, and then the reviews.

You see how important images are in e-commerce? If it doesn’t appeal to the eye, people online are going to scroll through and find something else that does.

But, why does this happen, especially with e-commerce and online shopping?

PEOPLE PREFER SEEING THINGS OVER READING ABOUT IT

We are living in the smart age. Everything from your toothbrush to your television is connected to the internet and your smartphone. We no longer type things to send a message to someone or look up something online. We snap it using our cameras and do the needful (Thank you Google Lens).

Look at all the marketing and advertising studies and surveys done over the years, the visual element has always come out as the winner over text. Yes, people do love a smart pun here, a hidden joke there. But that beautiful dress won’t sell through words, people wish to see the design, the fabric, the idea of how it may look on an actual person wearing it. Only then they’ll take a look at the price and think about placing an order for it.

But that beautiful dress won’t sell through words, people wish to see the design, the fabric, the idea of how it may look on an actual person wearing it. Only then they’ll take a look at the price and think about placing an order for it.

Here’s a fun fact: Of all the returns that are done after online shopping, over 20% of them happen because the actual product didn’t resemble what the buyer saw online on the website.

So, it is important that you put up real pictures of your products, shot by professionals, from multiple angles with a clean background and ample lighting.

IMAGES CONTRIBUTE TO YOUR SITE’S SEO

YES, you read that right. Images contribute greatly to the SEO of your e-commerce website. With more and more people moving towards image search using Google Snap or photo search apps, the search engine AI identifies and matches the image’s visual elements with the pictures you put up on your website. And when they match correctly, your product shows up as one of the search results. And this is not anyone but the SEO experts of Flora Fountain, the best seo company in Ahmedabad advice it to all.

Additionally, naming your product correctly by its name instead of generic terms like “image1.jpg” helps the search engine to match with the searches and pull up your product online. Your images must also have Alt Text, which describes the product, e.g. Blue Cotton Summer Dress with Floral Patterns. All the ideal keywords got used to describe your product image and it makes absolute sense too.

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