As we finish out the year, we can all agree that the way we shopped, communicated, spent time with family and friends has definitely changed. There are more people working from home now than ever before. There is also more online shopping than in previous years, Black Friday, Cyber Monday were both prime examples of this, with emails of sales starting even before Halloween.

Misconception

With this increased number of people being online more each day, the thought that online sales would skyrocket left some with a sour taste. Due to the changes in the economy and lack of funds, many businesses had to close their doors, and some will not be able to reopen. For those that are selling online, this is a big impact on your bottom line. The concept of missing work, smaller checks, being laid off has people budgeting even more than before. This misconception was that more people online meant more sales overall, which sadly was not the case.

Brighter 2021?

As we round the corner into the New Year, new search engine algorithms will be implemented, people will hope for a brighter 2021 and the belief that Covid will actually get under control. I do not know if Covid will be slowed down in 2021 or not; I do know that the way we did business before Covid has changed and I do not believe it will ever return.

Holding Your Breath or Surging Forward

As an online retailer, yes, this includes those that may only have a couple of items for sale on a social network, you can either ‘Hold your breath’ or Surge Forward. Personally, those we work with we are surging forward into 2021. We already have items in place, such as keyword preparations for the new algorithms, increased mobility on websites, different posting dates and times, and no longer comparing what happened before 2018 to what is taking place in 2021. For authors that means continuing to write and publish your books. For others that includes increasing your ads and planning them after the bills are paid but before the next round comes through.

Making your website and social networks user friendly is another way to surge forward. Personalized Marketing Inc has stressed many times that your website should be easy for the users to navigate, easy on the eyes and device friendly. Keeping your website coding up to date is a part of it. Making sure you are where your focus group is found and paying attention to what they care about. We could speculate on the other changes that may or may not be coming in 2021 or we can plan for what we can. One of my favorite sayings is the Serenity Prayer. “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.” by Reinhold Niebuhr (n.d.)

I cannot change how we navigate online; I cannot change the economy, but I can change my approach to it and chose to keep surging forward.

Increase Your Exposure

One way that we are going to continue moving forward in 2021, is that #PMInc will be hosting guest seminars at Coffee Time Romance in February. We will be covering topics such as Marketing, Websites, Amazon, and many others. Another way that we are embracing the change from 2020 to 2021 is by several of our clients being a part of the Silver Dagger Book Tours.

We will also be launching our secondary site https://PMInc.Tech, which came about due to my own demise… lol… okay so its not that bad. As you may have noticed we have a branded hashtag, #PMInc which we have put out everywhere. Due to this process, #PMInc produces more results for us on Search Engines than Personalized Marketing Inc. It happens and either you learn from it and utilize it or you make the same mistakes again, I was not good at history as a teenager but now I get how important it is.