Many new business owners are so busy working on the day-to-day operations, that they neglect the importance of building an online presence. Whether you operate out of a home office, brick-and-mortar location, or exclusively online you need to build a reputation for your brand. As the world becomes more digitally dependent, the best means of reputation building is through Internet marketing strategies.
Through strategic marketing and advertising techniques, you can increase your brand recognition, boost your credibility, and stand out among your competitors. It must also be understood that building an online presence requires more than just a few steps. You must utilize various platforms and continue to monitor, measure, and adjust as time goes on. Below are 10 ideas to consider:
1. Invest in Your Company Website – If you don’t have a company website at the moment, you’re doing yourself a big injustice. Customers often refer to company pages for information about products and services. Company websites act as a digital business card and in some instances a virtual storefront (for those who tend to sell merchandise online). Therefore, to establish an online presence you should have a well-optimized website.
2. Blogging – Blogging keeps your website filled with SEO-rich content and resourceful information your target audience might be interested in. Even generating one blog post per week can increase your traffic and boost your search engine rankings, which are essential to getting ahead of the competition in Google, Yahoo, or Bing searches.
3. Customer Reviews (and related sources) – If you’re new to business, you’ll need the help of your existing customers to help increase your online presence. Customer reviews are very valuable in that they provide interested parties with firsthand experiences on your products or services. Positive reviews can spread like wildfire and ultimately help to improve your online presence.
Once you’ve generated a few customer reviews, you can then utilize tools such as those offered at http://www.primary-intel.com/, like customer experience analysis. Based on information provided by the customers, such service providers can assist you in coming up with a solution to retaining and growing your customer reach.
4. Social Media – Social media is the perfect place to make an impression in online communities. With more than a million users daily, platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn can help you send messages about your brand, post valuable information for your customers, share stories, and even become more “social” with your target audience. It takes the “harshness” out of hard selling and creates a peaceful environment where you can get to know more about your target audience – and they can get to learn your company.
5. Forums – Everyone has advice that they can share with the world. Sometimes the best form of online marketing can be in the information that you’re able to provide. The more valuable your brand can be to your target audience (without trying to make a sale), the more inclined customers are to turn to your brand. There are tons of forums and question/answer sites that you could register for. As consumers ask questions relating to your industry, you can answer them and begin to build credibility.
6. Search Engine Optimization – SEO is not just for your website and blog posts. It is important to ensure that as you try to build your brand’s reputation, you utilize relevant keywords on a regular basis. From posting content on social media to answering questions for your consumers, try to incorporate key terms and phrases that are generating a lot of search results. This way, as consumers search the Internet for those phrases or terms, they’re automatically directed to your company.
7. Pay Per Click Campaigns (PPC) – Pay per click advertising is often overlooked, but it is a very affordable option when you’re trying to draw more traffic to your site or boost your online presence. Utilizing companies like Google or Facebook for ads can help you in gaining initial traction. As users click on the ads placed on popular sites and search engines, they are immediately directed to your website for more information.
8. Offer Freebies – Who doesn’t love the idea of getting something free? Having contests and offering free products or services can be a great way to break the ice and get the Internet buzz going about your company. Free pens, calendars, or promotional materials are great giveaways.
9. Online Directories – If you’re a brick-and-mortar location looking to increase your online presence, you can’t overlook the importance of registering with online directories. Sites like Yelp, for instance, allow you to record company contact information.
10. Mobile Friendly – We previously discussed a well-optimized website to boost your online presence. What cannot be forgotten, however, is the importance of making it mobile friendly. Google and other search engines penalize sites that are not mobile friendly, causing your website to end up at the end of the list.
Now that you have a bunch of new ways to begin building your online presence, it’s time to put some of these practices in motion. Whichever ideas you decide to use, ensure that you continually evaluate and adjust as needed. Eventually, you’ll know which methods work best for your target audience and you should begin to see a surge in your online presence.