In this day and age, the most important thing any business needs is an online marketing strategy. Almost everyone is on the internet these days, so the best way a small company can reach new customers is to get online. There are so many ways you can do your online marketing, and getting into it can be very daunting for a new business owner. So, with that in mind, here’s our handy guide to online marketing. It doesn’t matter if you are a complete newbie or have been working in online marketing for quite some time now. No matter how experienced you are, this guide can help you make sure everything you’re doing is up to scratch.
Website
Ok, first things first. You need a website. Even if you have a traditional shop made out of bricks and mortar, you still need a website for your business. These days, customers refer to Google to help them find new shops and products. If your company isn’t online, then you are reducing your potential audience. Unfortunately, though, creating a website isn’t enough. You should also make sure that it is SEO ready. What is SEO? It is what Google uses to rank the websites in its search results. The better your site’s SEO, the higher your website will be listed. And that means more people are likely to see you in the search results. You can sort out your SEO yourself, but it can be fairly tricky. Instead, speak to an ecommerce SEO company to help you out.
Log In to Social Media
It’s not just a website you need. Social media accounts also play a key part in online marketing. Almost everyone has their very own private account on Facebook or Twitter. So if your company is on those platforms as well, people stand a much greater chance of finding you. You need to be fairly active once you have set up social media accounts. Otherwise, if you don’t post anything for a few months, people who come across your site might think you have closed down. Post regular updates and new blog posts (I’ll come on to your company blog in a following point!). It is also a good idea to retweet and support other companies in your sector. Another advantage of social media is being able to interact with your customers. If anyone has a question or criticism, you can deal with them quickly in a professional manner. And it also gives others a chance to see that you do actually respond to your customers. If you ignore any public messages from customers, you could come across as quite ignorant.
Start a Blog
Another great way to improve your SEO and to interact with your customers is to start a company blog. Even if you think there is nothing suitable for your company to blog about, you will be pleasantly surprised! It’s possible to blog about absolutely anything. You could talk about trends and news in your industry sector. Or you could use the blog to focus on your local area, and the positive effect your business is having on it. Once you post a new blog post, it is super important to share it on all your social media platforms. Tag it with some hashtags so you can reach a wider audience. Hopefully, people who read it and enjoy it will retweet and share it with all their followers. This is a great way to spread your brand. Hopefully, you might even go viral!
Use Different Media
When you are posting updates to your Facebook and Twitter profiles, don’t just stick to writing a few sentences. People don’t really share these kinds of updates. To make your posts very shareable, try to mix up the media that you use. Things like photos, gifs, and videos work extremely well. You can either create your own or share other people’s. However, if you share media that isn’t yours, be sure to credit it. Otherwise, you could be faced with a tricky legal situation! If you start to create your own videos, post them on YouTube as well as on your social media. By creating a YouTube channel, you are starting another way to gain even more followers. And you can never have too many followers!
So, as you can see, there is no reason to fear online marketing. Once you get started, you might find that you even enjoy this part of your job! The possibilities with online marketing are endless. You never know where your company’s name might end up!
