Ask questions. Get answers.

Ask A.S.P.A - Australia South Pacific ASEAN Chamber of Commerce for some advice.

YouTube is a great channel and obviously gives you access to lots of targeting data to make sure your ads reach the right audiences plus you can retarget users via YouTube as well. TV is increasingly becoming as targeted as YouTube. You can now buy TV in a programmatic way and overlay audience data for your TV buys with what is called Adressable TV which incorporates the follwing:

• Connected TV (aka addressable, targetable & over-the-top) – this includes content delivered via a digital TV set or an over-the-top box e.g. Smart TVs, Roku, Apple TV, Chromecast, Xbox, PlayStation, etc. Think of it as having the same digital ad capabilities, just with a larger display size to show them on.
• Catch Up TV – a type of video-on-demand (VOD) that involves recording your TV programming for later playback e.g. Freeview, SBS On Demand, TenPlay, Plus7 and 9Now. The targeting capabilities and ad formats here are different both from connected and linear television.
• Linear TV – this refers to TV in its traditional sense where all programming is scheduled in advance with the main difference being that ads can be bought using advanced audience data and in a programmatic fashion.

Addressable TV can help to round out your strategy in the following ways:

• Reach Audiences At Their Most Engaged, With Full Opt-In
  • Does having the highest video completion rates of any device sound interesting? A TV screen is still the most captivating media format for audience viewability and there is full opt-in from the viewer.
• Boost Video Completed Views
  • Video completion rates are higher than on mobile devices and desktop.
• Take Personalisation to the Big Screen
  • Personalise your ads, same as you would with a digital video ad. Except, this time, these same ads get the living room prime time treatment!
• Achieve Transparency With Data
  • Forget third-party measurement. All of the analytics benefits that programmatic data provides can now be applied to TV advertising.
• Target Niche Audiences
  • Unleash the power of your DMP and CRM in order to run hyper-targeted TV campaigns based on existing audience data.
• Run Middle-of-the-Funnel Campaigns
  • Programmatic TV finally gives you the ability to move beyond awareness and engage your prospects further down the funnel on the biggest screen there is. This opens up a whole new world of marketing possibilities.

I would start following what MOZ come out with and watching Whiteboard Friday videos. I will also +1 Udemy and Lynda.com also has a lot of videos worth watching. Another great educational source is Coursera.

Great question Cassidy!! I'd love to answer this one with I personally LOVE SnapChat!!! At first it took a bit of getting used to since it was unlike any other social media channel, but sometimes you just want to give a quick update to your friends without having a deep long conversation. It's a way of keeping up with them even though you can't physically be there (since we're all super busy these days).

I also love the fact that none of it can be used to incriminate you in the future, or used to blackmail you in some way. Unfortunately this kind of things happen a lot with the invention of the smartphone (ability to take pictures quickly and where-ever) So you can still send you fun party photos to your friends without your future clients finding it on Facebook the next day.

It gives you a freedom and privacy you can't have in a public forum like Twitter or Facebook. 

Another thing I love about it not  being stored is that I tend to run a fine line in regards to my storage on my phone. SnapChat allows me to see what my friends are doing without having to save a photo of a half eaten hamburger onto my phone and me having to go and delete it later. This replaces SMS and emails which is great because sometimes the things you want to send you friends is really for that moment and most likely not important to keep.

I'm pretty sure snap chat was never invented as a tool to replace online forums - just another great channel for close friends to share short bursts of moments and information instead of sending a sms or an email.

It has a huge potential, because I'm sure more people send private sms and messages than posting on public social channel, and therefore there is more opportunity to make use of it :)

Bookkeepers can absolutely help you with your payroll and can be a great asset in helping you keep that department of your business running smoothly. A poor payroll system can lead to late payments, incorrect payments, low employee retention and poor reputation. Whether you pay your staff weekly, fortnightly or monthly, bookkeepers can save you a huge amount of time by checking and processing timesheets, applying any commissions payable and calculating tax and superannuation. They can also process payments to your employees’ bank accounts. Bookkeepers have great recordkeeping skills and can help you maintain accurate and up to date payroll records for compliance purposes. If you outsource payroll to a third party, your bookkeeper can also input the payroll data into your accounting system to you save time.

When it comes to customer service and support, I would recommend Xero. While there are no outbound contact numbers listed on the site, you can contact Xero customer support by email 24/7 and they are usually very prompt to respond. Once you get an email response from a Xero rep they will set up a time to chat. 

I also find the self-help guides on Xero's website really helpful - you can simply pop your query into the database to get step-by-step instructions and guides. On several occasions, these guides have been enough to answer my questions without having to email customer support.

Hi Ananda, one way of testing out the effectiveness of content syndication this to start small and concentrate on one social platform to begin with. For example if you're already on LinkedIn this is a great platform for appealing to other professionals and if you put up good quality articles and posts you'll soon see whether or not there is any demand for your content topics and quality. You are better off concentrating on one platform and becoming popular on that and then moving across horizontally to other platforms. By the same token, if you are guest blogging for other platforms, do your research and confirm they have healthy traffic, else you will waste a lot of time producing good content that is never viewed!

When you produce great content always repurpose it and leverage your effort by producing a video from an article as well an audio or a PDF - as many different types of media that you can.

Would be great to hear your thoughts @Brad Lyons @Philip Brookes @Quentin Aisbett 

Jackie, my stock answer for most service-based businesses is definitely to outsource, for the following reasons:

1. Depending on your familiarity with the plethora of tools, tactics and media available, it makes sense to go with the experts. Seldom will a business owner or single employee be across all relevant methodologies.
2. An outsourced agency is in my view, more responsible and more accountable. Even tho' it's not "money out of their own pocket," an independent agent can see what's needed, rather than what's wanted. An employee might not be allowed the flexibility to make recommendations or decisions that impact spending.
3. There's an adage about "sticking to your knitting." If marketing is not your strong suit, stick to what you do best – be it sales, manufacturing, people management, networking, product development etc. – and employ a range of the best minds available to fill in the gaps. Those skills are not easily embodied in one person (see Point 1).

The situations where it makes more sense to employ full timers arise when the business is sufficiently developed to afford, or require, dedicated in-house marketing staff. Even then, it should be looked at as a team effort, again see Point 1.

One exception might be when a new business partner is being considered for a business experiencing strong growth. If that person is a marketing expert across several fields and can make a substantial contribution to ongoing growth, it might make sense to bring them on board as a director or profit-sharer, rather than an employee.

Hope that helps.