Small businesses struggle to compete with corporations that have bigger budgets and have been around the industry for years. Moreover, small businesses need to compete with other small businesses in the same industry to build their brand and mark their presence online.
Traditional marketing has been an ancient strategy not applicable to modern times. Some businesses, such as local shops, still adopt this technique. However, for some small businesses, building their online presence is the best way to boost their sales and increase brand awareness.
Some might think that when you talk about building an online presence, this immediately links to a social media presence. Social media is just a part of your small business’s online presence. There are other strategies that can help small businesses thrive in this competitive market.
Why Do You Need to Boost Your Small Business’ Online Presence?
- It gets you discovered by new audiences. A good internet presence makes it simple for ideal customers who are not aware of your existence to find you, whether they are looking for what you have to offer.
- You will look credible to consumers. Before making a purchase, consumers consult a variety of sources. If you are active in multiple channels, consumers will read more information that will help them in their purchasing decision.
- Online presence is cheaper than traditional marketing. Furthermore, you can determine if your content is working by using stats from your website and social channels.
- You can convert your leads to paying customers. By having an online presence, you can create strategies and opportunities your leads can engage in for them to make a purchase finally.
- Google not only uses the information on your website to make your presence available on their search engine. Other channels can indirectly affect your presence on search engines, so you need to reach out more than your usual website.
- It can contribute to your buyers’ journey at different points.
- You can build relationships with your audiences and customers.
- It provides better customer service and satisfaction. There is also the chance to set up a 24/7 customer support system.
5 Effective Strategies to Boost Your Small Business Online
Focus on Your Website
If you want to look and sound professional, your business must have a website. Building a website can help you focus on growing your organic traffic and SEO ranking on search engines.
In 2021, 70% of people who purchase research the product online, which means that building your optimized website can make you recognizable. With Google having over 360 billion searches in a year, someone might discover your website by doing a Google search.
However, you have to remember that it’s not about just having a website, but you need to work on optimizing every part or page of it. Website optimization means making your website friendlier and better for search engines to recommend it to people who search online.
How to Optimize your Website?
There are several elements to discuss when it’s about optimizing a website, so here are some steps you have to follow.
- Do keyword research for your blog post and web content. Relevant keywords will help you rank higher on search engines.
- Ensure pages load quickly
- Make it mobile-friendly
- Create simple and responsive web pages
- Work on internal and external linking
- Make sure to optimize content such as the meta description, meta title, alt text on images, etc.
- Mind the technical part of your website, such as robot.txt, indexing via Google Console, fixing broken links, and more.
- Schema markup
In addition to optimizing your website for SEO marketing, you can also focus on building your content marketing strategy by providing articles, blog posts, and infographics to your website. Do not forget to do keyword research when creating content for your website.
Build Email List and Email Marketing
Email marketing is still relevant today as it was ten years ago. Marketers have found that for every $1 spent, there is an ROI of $44.
Using email for marketing your content works differently than other marketing strategies. For email marketing to work, you need first to build your email list.
Building your email list can be done in many ways. Once you have collected the necessary number of leads, you can start engaging with them.
One strategy you can try to grow your email list is to provide exclusive content so that only those who sign up to your email list can get access to it. You can produce monthly content, which can convert more leads and boost sales. Do not forget to use calls-to-action to promote your newsletter online.
After growing your email list, you can now start creating email campaigns to promote products by offering sales or sharing content you have on your blog. Email marketing is also a way to convince web visitors who have left their cart without checking out.
Build Social Media Presence
Social media is always synonymous with building an online presence, and that is because there are over billions of users. If you have a profile on any social media platforms, you can start growing your presence over there.
You need to ensure that you choose the social media platform where your customers are always engaging. You can do this by studying your website’s analytics. Once you have determined which platform to choose, then it’s time to grow it.
When posting on social media, do not just post images or videos of your product. In fact, trying to sell a product pushes your followers away. It is better to share valuable content on your social media channels. You have to create stories that will connect to your audience.
Part of growing your social media presence is to engage with your followers. Learn to like, reply to comments, and share. Building a community with your followers is far more powerful than just having thousands of followers who do not find any interest in your brand.
You can also leverage influencers to build your online presence. Working with influencers, particularly micro-influencers within your niche, can drive traffic to your social media and website.
Use Video Marketing
Of all the forms of media available today, video is the most consumed content online. About 88% of people who watched an explainer video are convinced to buy the product.
If video is powerful enough to convince people to make a purchase, then it is vital to focus on creating such content for your business.
When creating video content, you have to set your goals first. Is the video made to gain more traffic, build brand awareness, or explain a product? If you know your goals, you can easily create your video content with that intention.
Video marketing does not have to be intimidating. In fact, you do not need to have a bigger budget to create one. All you need are the basic tools such as a camera, editing software, crew, script, and a great location. If you do not know much about video editing, you can hire freelance video editors at an affordable price.
You do not have to create long videos since 73% of people would prefer to watch a short video than read a blog post. So, making short videos is effective.
Encourage Your Followers to Leave a Review
You can build your online presence and credibility by showing your visitors reviews and ratings from other users. When you share what your customers are saying about you, it can attract other people since it builds trust.
Remember that word of mouth is always an effective way of convincing people to make a purchase. People want to know if a product or service is good not by watching ads but by reading the experiences of others.
Ensure to add a review section on your website, and encourage your customers to leave a review. You can reach them through email.
Add a rating section on your Facebook page and create a Google Business page for users to leave their reviews there. Another site that people also use to leave a review is Trustpilot.
Study Your Online Presence
Building your small business is not only making sure you have an online presence. It’s also about maintaining and continually growing your presence online.
If you want to know if your campaign or strategies are working, you have to check on their performance. You can use Google Analytics to study how your website is performing. Google Analytics can even show where your traffic is coming from and what devices they use.
Furthermore, you can use tools, like Ahrefs or SEMRush, to check your SEO performance. It’s also a tool you can use to search for keywords and learn about your competitors.
For social media channels, they offer insights into those who have a business profile.
Using the data on your various channels, you can improve your campaign and what is working for your business.
Conclusion
Building your online presence can bring numerous advantages over a traditional method of marketing. However, it is vital to know that it may take some time to build your presence online, so you have to be patient and continue to work on it. In addition, utilize technology like SEO and social media tools to your advantage.
AUTHOR BIO
VANESSA VENUGOPAL
Vanessa Venugopal is a passionate content writer. With four years of experience, she mastered the art of writing in various styles and topics. She is currently writing for Softvire Australia – the leading software eCommerce company in Australia and Softvire New Zealand.
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