The Owls blog

Plain-spoken marketing, no jargon

Practical guides on SEO, paid media, and turning traffic into customers, written by the team doing the work.

Brand strategy consultant leading a positioning session with a small business team at a whiteboard
Digital Marketing

Brand Strategy Consultant: What They Do and When to Hire One

A brand strategy consultant is a specialist who helps a business decide what it stands for, who it serves, and how it should sound…

22 min read
Small business owner reviewing her website on a laptop at her shop counter
SEO

Small Business SEO: A Practical Guide for Canadian Businesses

Small business SEO is the ongoing work of making a small company’s website easier for Google to find, read, and recommend, a…

26 min read
Canadian small-business owner reviewing an email marketing campaign dashboard on a laptop
Digital Marketing

Email Marketing Tools: A Guide for Canadian Businesses

The best email marketing tools for most Canadian businesses are platforms that bring list management, automation, templates, deliv…

26 min read
Small business owner reviewing an email newsletter layout on a laptop
Digital Marketing

Email Marketing Strategy: A Guide for Canadian Businesses

An email marketing strategy is a written plan for using email to turn subscribers into repeat customers, and most small businesses…

26 min read
Small business team reviewing a brand strategy document and mood board in a bright office
Digital Marketing

What Is a Brand Strategy? A Guide for Canadian Businesses

A brand strategy is a long-term plan, usually built around five to seven core elements, that defines what your business stands for…

24 min read
Web developer and SEO specialist reviewing a website's technical health on two monitors in a bright office
SEO

Technical SEO: A Guide for Canadian Businesses

Technical SEO is the work of tuning your website’s infrastructure and code so search engines and AI systems can crawl, rende…

30 min read
Marketing strategist reviewing a pay-per-click advertising campaign on a laptop in a bright office
Paid Media

What Is PPC? A Plain-English Guide to Pay-Per-Click Advertising

PPC, or pay-per-click, is an online advertising model where you pay a fee only when someone actually clicks your ad, and for most…

22 min read
Canadian small business owner and a marketing strategist reviewing a link building plan on a laptop
SEO

Should You Buy Backlinks? A Guide for Canadian Businesses

Buying backlinks, which typically runs from about $50 to $500 per link in Canada and far more for high-authority placements, means…

27 min read
Marketing professional reviewing website conversion performance on a monitor
Web Design

What Is a Good Conversion Rate? Benchmarks for Canadian Businesses

A good conversion rate is generally 2% to 5%, but the right benchmark depends on your industry, traffic source, and what you count…

25 min read
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