2021 was crazy. Despite everything that happened, Kallen Media had a record-breaking year! We grew as a business by focusing on our strengths and putting our clients first. Now that the New Year has passed, we wanted to reevaluate and reflect on it. So, welcome to our 2021 year in review!

In this blog, we will break down the year we had. We will cover every vital marketing tool we used this year, like SEO and web development software. We will also introduce you to some of the new clients we started working with, including our new clients in Canada! Finally, we will give you an insider peek at some of the projects we hope to bring to you next year. So let’s start off the 2021 year in review!

Marketing Tools

 It wouldn’t be a year in review if we didn’t talk about some of the vital resources we used! As a digital marketing agency, we use many brand-new tools to bring fresh content and designs to our client’s projects. Digital marketing resources are unique because they use the built-in data collection of websites to identify and target your ideal niche. These tools break down neatly into three categories.

First, there are web development tools; this category includes front and back-end building platforms. Second, we have conversion optimization programs or SEO. Finally, we have graphic design tools. These things help us create efficient landing pages. When we’re sending out any content, graphic design programs are what we use to make sure everything is visually appealing to customers! 

Web Development

Designing a website is the first step any business has to take to start its digital marketing journey. A website is your company’s face online, and it’s vital to your company’s long-term health. In 2021 we had the opportunity to update and create multiple different websites. Without a doubt, the most crucial web development tool for us is Divi. Divi is a front-end development platform that lets us develop websites fast. However, more importantly, the Divi builder scales easily. 

The Divi platform allows us to build a website that we can change on the fly and grow with your business. Divi also comes with an incredible amount of pre-licensed template materials. All of these features make Divi a versatile development tool. The flexibility that Divi offers is what makes it so important. Once we have your platform live, we can start the optimization!

Conversion Optimization

SEO uses conversion optimization tools to ensure the optimization strategies we developed are working appropriately. There are hundreds of programs that make up the SEO toolkit. By far, our favorites are Semrush and Google AdWords. Semrush is a stand-alone SEO tool that helps you identify keywords using live analytics. Keywords are the building blocks for most optimization practices, so you need to make sure you’re using recognized words that track well. Semrush gives our clients the peace of mind that their keywords are relevant to their work and hit with their target audiences. After a solid base plan with Semrush, we use AdWords’ built-in tools to monitor campaigns. 

AdWords are Google’s built-in pay-per-click advertising systems. Because it is integrated centrally into Google, this program is bar-none the best SEO tool in digital marketing. Adwords integrates live data directly from accurate searches to help you identify keywords and works independently to identify related words! We used both these tools consistently throughout the year to create and verify innovative ad campaigns for our clients. Finally, we used graphic design to bring everything together!

Graphic Design

If you see something you like online, we will almost guarantee that a graphic designer will look at it first. Graphic design refers to creating art or media to communicate a message. As a digital marketing agency, our graphic design team worked hard in 2021, creating engaging social media and web designs. We use many programs to both find and edit content. But by far, the most helpful tool in our graphic design handbook was Canva.

In 2021 our most used graphic design tool was Canva. Canva is a user-friendly design program with convenient templates for everything from Instagram posts to posters. We even used Canva to design our 2021 holiday card! Canva allows us to customize individual elements, attach logos, and even color coordinate an entire campaign’s graphics easily! Now that we covered all of our favorite marketing tools let’s move on to our favorite part of the 2021 year in review; Our client spotlights!

Our Clients

Just like your business, we are nothing without our loyal clientele. And we want to take a second out of our time to highlight some of the clients who trusted us to handle their various marketing efforts. Our diverse clients range from small businesses to tech rental companies.

This year was record-breaking for us, so we have a lot we want to talk about it! This section is a doozy between new projects, fresh clients, and valued returning customers! To make it easier to digest, we will break down our clients into two major sections; Nonprofit, tech clients. We are also going to talk a bit about our new international client! Let’s start by talking about our clients in the nonprofit sector.

Nonprofits

It wouldn’t be a proper 2021 year in review if we didn’t have a nonprofit segment! Our nonprofit marketing team is Hugely important to Kallen Media. We started by focusing on nonprofit marketing efforts, and we love that the industry now trusts us. But we haven’t abandoned our smaller clients. A big part of our 2021 year was maintaining ad grants and campaigns for local charities. We enjoyed working with national teams after years of offering pro-bono work and services to local nonprofits. 

Project Giving Kids is a network for nonprofits to connect to kids under the broader banner of their focus causes. PGK has projects going in every state in America and even has systems set up if you want to bring a project to your community! As an experienced nonprofit marketer, we could promote consistent messaging through the proper channels. Similar to nonprofits, the tech rental industry has its own set of unique challenges.

Tech Rentals

Technology rentals is a complicated field. It can be stressful to work between incredible demand from clients, tight deadlines, and lots of sections to coordinate. These factors combine to create a situation where it’s essential to delegate tasks. That’s where we come in! Kallen Media has designed custom strategies to help tech rental companies flourish in a harsh environment. In 2021, Kallen Media was the go-to for tech rental companies’ marketing work!

Tech rental companies need to have premium websites and consistent social media. People in the industry will struggle to remain competitive without good assets. Most of the work we do for tech rental companies revolves around web development and SMM. Managing social media presence was a big part of our year. We even designed standard tech-friendly themes to make engaging content and build some websites from the ground up. Tech rentals were even responsible for Kallen Media’s first international client!

International Clients

Growing a business to the point of international trade is an incredible milestone for any company! In 2021, Kallen Media was able to celebrate that achievement. We were lucky enough to work with Montreal Computer Rentals on multiple projects. Our team got to handle everything from groundbreaking web development to creating a social media presence! We will take a section out of our 2021 review to highlight MCR’s work!

MCR is one of Montreal’s leading tech renters. Recently, MCR was looking for ways to keep standing out from their competition. We cemented that goal for Montreal Computer Rentals by redesigning their website and coordinating SMM strategies. The new site is sleeker than ever, and we are reaching huge potential niches with social media outreach. Our work in 2021 with MCR was so fun, and we can’t wait to grow that relationship in the coming year.

2022

2021 was extraordinary by any metric for us, whether you look at blogging, SMM, or other services. And we want to make sure we have an even more explosive year coming up! Moving forward, we are incredibly excited to face whatever 2022 brings us. Kallen Media is proud to say that in 2022 we are going live with a brand new website! We hope that the website makes it even easier for you to contact your favorite digital marketing team. We have a lot of goals and projects we can’t share, but we want to tell you about some of our more general hopes for 2022.

One of our main goals for 2022 is to continue our dedication to our clients. That goal goes hand in hand with a stunning platform filled with easy-to-use tools. We also hope to improve our customer’s ROI. We’re expanding our operation by folding innovative tools into our current strategies. One example is web development, where we plan to incorporate new front-end builders to blow your audience away. In 2022 we hope to find new ways to promote your company’s message. 

The 2021 Year in Review

Thank you for reading our 2021 year in review blog. 2021 was a massive year for us. We did work for companies in nearly every primary sector of the digital marketing world. We brought nonprofits stunning designs using Canva for graphic design. Kallen Media provided tech rental companies with cutting-edge websites with Divi to keep them ahead of the competition. We used Semrush and Google AdWords to ensure clients’ web presence was perfect. Finally, we continued to build trust among our clients by providing practical strategies using cutting-edge tools. We had a fantastic year that we hope to bring that same energy into 2022.

Marketing is our passion, and assisting companies with outreach fills the Kallen Media team with joy. We hope to expand operations and bring our services to even more people this year. If you need help understanding current trends, Kallen Media is here. Want support implementing innovative marketing practices? Get a quote for Kallen Media’s service today.

Recently Kallen Media has been expanding! One of our new SEO clients is a Canadian company, which officially marks our expansion outside the US! We were elated to start this work, and we couldn’t wait to tell you about it. So today, we will teach you about MCR, our introduction, and our work together. Welcome to Kallen media’s MCR company spotlight!

This blog tells you everything you need to know about MCR and our work with them. We even cover the basics of short-term rentals and SEO. We will also talk about how we found a client out of the states. And then touch on the benefits of networking in your community. But let’s start by introducing you to our first Canadian client, MCR.

Who is MCR?

 

MCR got its start in the ’80s, and they have grown to provide all of North America with equipment rentals. With fast deadlines, growing demand, and site-specific requirements, equipment rentals are a notoriously tricky business. But MCR is successful because they provide above-and-beyond customer service and technical support. As a full service. MCR is proud to serve B2B and B2C clients in hosting events and tradeshows all over the continent!

We were lucky enough to meet MCR through our work with the ITRA. We have talked about them before, so don’t forget to check out that blog too. Membership in the ITRA provides a host of benefits, like access to other competitive businesses, networking opportunities, and the chance to build lasting relationships. The short-term rental industry can be tough to navigate, so it helps to have a strong support network. What does a company in the AV and IT rental space do every day with that in mind?

AV and Computer Rentals

 

Kallen Media has worked with AV and computer rental companies before. Our past work for Hartford taught us a lot, and MCR operates similarly. MCR primarily focuses on AV and computer rentals which is a tough market. Audiovisual equipment often requires precise technical knowledge and equipment, so renting it presents a unique challenge. Everything affects the sound, so the team needs to outline clients’ event space and needs. Ensuring clients’ needs are met is a big part of MCR’s day-to-day work.

Making sure people are happy in the rental industry often requires a lot of equipment. And that gear has to be maintained. For example, if a company needs to speak to a large crowd, they better have working mics and amps! Fortunately, companies like MCR shoulder that maintenance and storage cost to make gear more affordable for small businesses hosting events. In short, AV and computer rentals are where supply chain management and customer service meet.

SEO

 

SEO work is complicated back-end web work that will help ensure your site ranks on search engines. These rankings help determine who sees your website, so they matter a lot to businesses. Many different factors can affect SEO, but primarily they all focus on community engagement and your website. The work we did for MCR mainly consisted of the latter.

The SEO work we did for MCR primarily focused on website maintenance. Over time different parts of a website will grow at different speeds. And eventually, whole sections might be outdated. Ensuring proper images are being used and consistent presentation can go a long way in making a website feel complete rather than mashed together over time.

MCR Company Spotlight

 

MCR is one of Canada’s premier AV and computer rental services. They offer everything you could need to run a tradeshow, set up an office, and so much more. This post talked about who MCR is, how we met, and our work together. We have already talked about the Various benefits of ITRA membership, and our business with MCR is more proof of that. Our work with the ITRA has enabled Kallen Media to break into the Canadian market, and we couldn’t be any more grateful.

Our work with MCR was mostly SEO-based to help boost their online presence and we were proud to write this MCR Company Spotlight. But Kallen Media doesn’t only do SEO work. We are a one-stop digital marketing firm with SMM, google ads, and web development teams who are ready to help. If you’re interested in hiring a professional digital marketing service, Kallen Media is the team for you. Contact us today, and we can help develop the perfect plan to make sure your business is ready to engage with the digital world.

Nonprofit marketing is a complicated project that involves a lot of different tools. You need to maintain contact with people, develop new support, and generate branded content. Without qualified help, these tasks can feel impossible to complete. Kallen Media has years of experience running digital marketing campaigns for nonprofits. And today, we want to share some of what we learned with you! So that’s why today we’re going to give you a simple overview of digital marketing for nonprofits.

So, where do you start when you want to understand the best digital marketing tools for the nonprofit sector? In the past, we have talked about nonprofit specifics like google ad grants and more. Our team thinks it’s best to break down some areas where nonprofits see the most significant ROI. We will give you a rundown on essential nonprofit marketing elements like email marketing and how to engage your regulars and generate new supporters! We will also talk about how these factors play off one another and which are best to focus on for specific campaigns. But let’s start by talking about email marketing and how it can help nonprofits.

Email Marketing

Email marketing is an excellent tool for nonprofits because it lets you engage with a broad audience. While a large number of recipients might never respond, you can spread awareness and potentially track down a smaller group of quality supporters. No matter what, an email marketing campaign will help educate some of your supporters. Simply by receiving the information relevant to your charity, you are helping spread the word! But what happens with the audience who wants to engage further? 

Well-designed email campaigns will have calls to action and click-through links that lead new supporters to relevant landing pages. If your copy is well-made, a certain percentage of people will be willing to become full-blown supporters! Because these campaigns rely on numbers, the wider you go with the project, the more successful your email advertisements will be. But the digital marketing sector of nonprofit marketing doesn’t stop there; We also have to find clever ways to grow these relationships. So how do you maintain this newfound audience interest?

Social Media

Having a good social media management plan can boost your exposure online. Everyone knows that you can build an audience with your social network, But nonprofits have a unique advantage; people care about you already! As a charity, the content you create will likely have a strong emotional impact on your audience. So what does a robust social media plan look like for the average nonprofit?

Nonprofit audiences and supporters engage heavily with posts where they can see the nonprofit team at work. Photos and videos of volunteers, testimonials, and relevant B-roll all get a boost in engagement. In our experience, these trends mean your video content is hugely successful. But at the end of the day, you’re still essentially running social media for a business. It would be best if you made sure that your social media presence is well-manicured and consistent.

Engaging Your Regular Supporters

Most of the methods above are focused on raising awareness and gaining support. But digital marketing tools can also help you strengthen your connections to active supporters. If you only want to reach your core network, an email campaign can target your dedicated base. And your social media is the best place for supporters to engage with your community. But modern digital marketing tools can make these groups easier to identify and improve communication! SEO tools show a measure of the successes and failures of a digital marketing push. But what exactly can SEO analytics do for a nonprofit?

Advertisers use SEO tools to identify trends in your users and give you data about actual customers. In the nonprofit sector, these tools can help you ensure you achieve goals efficiently. If your web designer implements some simple SEO monitoring tools, you can start learning more about where your strengths are. Tools like keyword wizards and cookie-enabled landing pages allow websites to collect data like a focus group. And once you have that information, you can plan future projects around what’s working for you. Similarly, this data can help you understand what content is more effective with your supporters. Understanding why someone became a supporter and what they are engaging with can help you create stronger connections. 

Digital Marketing for Nonprofits

Digital marketing tools are taking nonprofit marketing by storm. So today, we broke down some of the most effective tools we use to do digital marketing for nonprofits. We covered the advantages of email campaigns and how to best use your social media presence. We also gave you some tips on using your SEO tools to enforce your relationships with your base. But we understand that running all of these different projects can be too much for a nonprofit. If you’re looking to outsource any section of your nonprofit’s marketing plans, Kallen Media can help. Learn more on our website!

Your website design creates the first impression for your audience; you must ensure that it’s engaging enough to entice them to learn more about your business.

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Social media marketing is now an essential component of a successful marketing strategy, and it’s used to promote your content and boost brand awareness.

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It’s a great way to raise brand recognition and develop relationships with prospects.

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Search engine optimization is a great way to promote your website. It’s affordable, it’s effective, and it pays off. But there is a catch – SEO takes some time to achieve any meaningful results. These results can be a severe drawback when getting a business off the ground or promoting a new website. That is why some people try to circumvent it by relying on black hat SEO instead. But black hat SEO is risky, and it can cost you a lot in terms of ranking, reputation, and even long-term success. So what are some of the tactics you should avoid?

What is black hat SEO?

When Google determines the ranking of your website in search results, it does so using clever bots and sophisticated algorithms. But no matter how good Google is, it’s almost always possible to develop creative solutions that will trick the machine. In the early days of SEO, that’s precisely what happened – people would discover what made Google tick and exploit it to inflate their rankings artificially. For this reason, search engines now have specific rules to ensure they’re serving up the best possible results for their users.

 

Whether or not they follow these rules, SEO tactics are divided into three categories: white hat, grey hat, and black hat. White hat SEO follows the guidelines set by search engines. Grey hat SEO technically falls within the rules, but the practices used are still frowned upon. Finally, black hat SEO falls under SEO practices that go against search engine guidelines. Why would anyone want to employ SEO tactics that search engines specifically condemn? The answer is simple – they give quick results. When you’re just starting a business and your website doesn’t influence other brands in the industry to rely on, this can seem like an attractive alternative.

What are some ordinary black hat SEO tactics?

People get creative with breaking the rules; consequently, there are hundreds of different black hat practices one could employ. But if you’re looking for an effective marketing strategy for the long-term, these are the main tactics to stay away from:

• link farming: setting up several websites so that you can link back and forth between them and create the illusion of many backlinks
• keyword stuffing: using the target keyword excessively to the point where it affects the quality of the content
• doorway pages and redirects: immediately taking the user to an unrelated, often malicious page when they click on a link
• cloaking: serving up different pages for search engine bots and users
• negative SEO: lowering competitors’ rankings by spamming their comments, directing suspicious links at them, and even hacking their websites

Why should you avoid black hat SEO?

Even though black hat practices often show quick results, they come at a high cost. It’s best to avoid them because you’ll face some serious consequences.

You risk negatively impacting your rankings and visibility.

Typically, black hat tactics work by attracting tons of traffic to your website. But traffic quantity is not the only thing that determines your Google ranking. Traffic quality will affect other measurements, such as bounce rates, time-on-page, abandonment rates, and more. Ultimately, the negatives will outweigh the positives, and your ranking will suffer even if you’re never found out.

You could get penalties.

The more likely problem, however, is that Google’s algorithm will catch up to you. This could then lead to penalties of varying severity. You might experience a drop in rankings, limitations on new content positioning, decreased domain authority, and even outright bans. Even when the penalty itself is not permanent, recovering from it will take a lot of time and effort.

 

Your authority and reputation will suffer.

Google ranks websites it can trust higher than those it can’t. This is why domain authority is so important. Domain authority consists of several measurements, many of which you cannot control. But a significant component of it is backlinks. This is something you can influence. Getting authoritative site backlinks, either organically or through link building, will improve your reputation on Google. But if you try to manipulate your backlink portfolio using link farming, spam comments, and other black hat practices, this can severely damage your domain authority for years to come. Given how vital domain authority is, your ranking will undoubtedly suffer.

Your user experience scores will be low.

SEO is ultimately about user experience. All the different measurements that go into an algorithm are supposed to be indicators of customer satisfaction. So it’s not enough to drive traffic to your website; you need to make sure your users are happy with what they find. Keep redirecting them to unrelated pages, making them read nonsensical content stuffed with keywords, and linking them to websites that don’t provide any value. You will only ensure they never revisit your website.

You won’t achieve long-term results.

The big selling point of black hat practices is fast results. But those results don’t last. Whether it’s because poor user experience lowers your ranking or you’re discovered by Google, trying to trick the algorithm will eventually backfire. So if your goal is to be successful long-term, you should focus on white hat SEO. It will take longer to build up your website with it, but patience will pay off in the long run.

What should you do instead of black hat SEO?

Instead of investing in the quick and risky black hat SEO, you should focus on white hat practices. This includes improving page loading speeds, adopting a responsive design and optimizing for mobile, using keywords and their variations naturally, and building a backlink portfolio relevant to your niche. All this will take some time and effort to achieve, and you probably won’t see any results for months. But once you reach a certain level of authority and a particular ranking in search results, things will get much more accessible. You won’t have to worry about significant drops or penalties. Not to mention, your users will appreciate your website more. In the end, playing by the rules will pay off.