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Clarity

Shem Szot

Toronto, Canada

Current VP of Marketing, Sales and Ecommerce at a Toronto based startup (StickerYou.com) where I have helped to achieve nearly tripple digit Y/Y growth. Past partner in an email marketing startup (EmailTrack.com) with B2B and B2C experience in small companies and HP (B2B Manager LA and Canada)

$2.50/min

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Digital Marketing Start-ups Social Media Marketing Email Marketing Digital Strategy Affiliate Marketing Business Strategy Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Ecommerce Strategy Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

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Ecommerce

Ecommerce is certainly the largest trend of the last few decades. I've been lucky to have participated in this space in various roles, from leading IT dev teams, to project managing supply chain integrations. I have also consulted on ecommerce platforms (from enterprise grade platforms like Websphere and Intershop to small business platforms like Magento and ZenCart). I've also gone through many iterations of ecommerce design philosophies and have worked on Agile teams developing platforms from early stage UX design to ongoing site optimization. Whether it's questions around site optimization, tools to maximize conversions or emerging technologies, I think I may be very helpful.

Digital Marketing

Digital Marketing is a tricky and quickly changing landscape. Companies struggle with where to invest their money and achieve the best returns. This is where I come in. I'm not only a digital marketer, but also a mathematician at heart. What most people understand, but fail to focus on is that marketing is just a science of number. I can help you formulate a strategy that will result in immediate improvements in your ROI (Return on Investment)

Feel free to read my article on digital marketing on my linkedin profile.

Coaching and Leadership

Even though I'm not a professional coach, I pride myself in having developed fantastic relationships with my employees. Having managed organizations across many continents and cultures with remote employees and local offices, one thing is key, leaders understanding of the leadership and coaching as being a journey of self discovery. Feel free to read my linkedin article on "Upside Down Leadership".

Email Marketing

I was one of the early pioneers of email marketing and partner in EmailTrack.com, one of the first early stage email marketing delivery and analytic companies. We served customers such as Bank of America and Merrill Lynch. After departing from the company I've been heavily engaged in developing email programs for companies I've worked for (HP, StickerYou) as well as consulting startups on effective email marketing strategies. Some core ideas I tend to focus on is list structure and data elements, segmentation, retention, analytics and personalization.

Answers 7
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Answers

Shem Szot answered

Is blogging still the main stream for fashion ?

Facebook would like you to believe that everything just happens on FB and you don't need any content outside of the FB eco system. I can absolutely tell you that's not the case. There are hundreds of thousands of people putting stuff up on instagram / FB and that does not make them influencers. If your goal is to become a blogger then you need a blog :) If your goal is just to become some sort of an influencer, then you can become one on any of the SocialMedia platforms and you don't really need a blog, but in my opinion, when you have your own blog you free yourself from any one medium as you actually own the content, the way it's displayed and where it will be featured. To summarize, I would always start with good content and you might as well get a blog. There is no down side.

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Social Media Marketing

Blog Marketing

Blogger

Shem Szot answered

How important are traction and major milestones for a start up?

Traction, if defined as getting interest or sales from customers is extremely important. Lots of people think that they may be able to get investors in just on an in idea. The truth is this almost never happens for 1st time entrepreneurs. On the question of major milestones however, I would not worry about this as much. The important thing is to continue to re-evaluate your assumptions, target audiences, product to market need fit. You will find your milestones keep shifting that that is perfectly fine as long as you are getting traction or on your way to getting traction.

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Business Development

Goal Setting

Start-ups

Shem Szot answered

We need new ways to get applicants to apply for our open position. What other ways besides billboards and word of mouth there is?

Consider service providers which work in specific employee sub-segments. For example, create a relationship with service providers servicing the aboriginal segment. This is just an example, but you can work with service providers who hire people with certain disabilities, etc.. Service providers are always looking to staff at entry level positions.

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Marketing Strategy

Marketing

Social Media Marketing

Shem Szot answered

I would be careful with removing such a blog post. If a post is receiving a lot of traffic it is because likely people have linked to it. Removing such a blog post will result in your back-links being removed and the link juice will be lost. If there are enough external links pointing to your post your entire domain may suffer. If you really want to remove such a post you would first have to do some back link analytics to see who is pointing to your post and whether the links are follow or no follow. Removing a page which has only external no-follow links will not result in a penalty. If you want more info let me know.

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SEO

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO Strategy

Shem Szot answered

What should we do if our users are expecting a free service, but we are unable to meet the cost?

I've read all the answers provided and even though I think they are valid, I believe they miss one critical thing. The value of you obtaining a customer is not the $9.99 that you may get from them (or whatever you are charging), but the data you gather. In the financial industry to the contact is worth far more then anything you could ever charge a monthly fee for. The devil is in the details but I have lots of ideas on how you could monetize. We can talk further if you'd like.

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Business Strategy

Strategic Planning

Marketing Strategy

Shem Szot answered

Looking to hire a person that handles PPC for a digital marketing firm. What should I know?

Well, the most basic answer is that you could look for certifications. However, that only takes you so far. Any PPC professional worth his/her salt also has experience with PPC management software (Kenshoo, Marin, Acquisio), etc. Ask what experience they have and what they like dislike. I have my favourites :) More over any good PPC expert has their own strategies for managing and structuring campaign. Ask what strategies they use. GIve sample cases and how they think. However, you really have to know what you are doing to hire well. I would suggest you get a PPC expert to do the interviewing and screening for you. Identify 2/3 good people and you hire one that you like for the personality fit.

Good Luck :)

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Digital Marketing

Digital Marketing Strategy

Digital Media

Shem Szot answered

How can I find & recruit good affiliates that can actually help grow my website and avoid the "coupon" craze affiliates that always want to signup?

First you have to know a bit about Affiliate marketing and realize that actually there are at least very different types of affiliates and they all serve different purposes in the sales cycle. Some help push value conscious consumers over the edge (ie, coupon based sites that you refer to), but others drive a totally different purpose.. They are more upper funnel (Loyalty, Content, Non-Profit publishers). I could help you create a plan and policies to effectively navigate the affiliate space. Good luck :)

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Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate Management

Affiliate Networks

Reviews

Member since March 2016