There are five main ways to market your small business online. Every small business should have a website and an online digital marketing strategy to help boost the traffic going to that website. Some of these methods are fr but can be time-consuming and difficult for those who lack the technical prowess to implement a digital marketing strategy. For those that want to grow their business but don’t have time to mess around, it’s a good idea to hire a digital strategist.
We’ve listed our top 5 digital marketing strategies which we believe most Australian businesses can benefit from. The benefit of some of these strategies will be greater for certain industries than others.
Our top 5 digital marketing strategies
Search engine marketing
If you want to grow your business, you need search engines to bring you more exposure and traffic. The higher you are in search engine results, the better it will be for you in the long run. That’s why you want to find the right keywords and rank for them as quickly as possible.
There is “organic” search that requires you or an SEO to optimise your website and external factors to improve your visibility on Google. Performing search engine optimisation will help boost your visibility and it will bring you the much-needed exposure. This translates into more clients, in the long run, something that every business should pursue.
There is also Google Ads for paid Google search marketing. Both can be great ways to generate targeted traffic which will result in more sales. Google Ads marketing can be expensive if your ads aren’t optimised for your business model and demographic so it is always best to speak to an expert. Our Google Ads marketing specialists can help you retain a higher conversion rate so that you don’t waste your marketing spend on pointless search terms.
Local search marketing
A popular segment of SEO is local SEO which is where you aim to rank for “[keyword] in [location]”. This is perfect for small businesses that are targeting keywords within a local suburb or city. Sitelabs has local SEO specialists in Melbourne that can help you optimise your website and Google My Business listing to ensure that you rank locally.
It’s also very important to rank high locally too. Lots of businesses are targeting local customers, so it’s imperative to have a local presence, one that really stands out. That means you need to use local keywords that include your suburb or city’s name, you also want to have a map on your website to show where your business is located, the phone number and your address.
On top of that, it makes a lot of sense to create a Google My Business page for your company. This way whenever someone searches for your company on Google, they will be able to see all the information they need, included what’s above, the opening hours, when you have the most traffic, and so on.
We recently wrote a detailed article on why local SEO is important for small businesses.
Social media marketing
You need a good social presence for your business, as most of your customers tend to have a social media account. You need to showcase your business by providing industry news, company news, product releases, and anything else that might seem interesting for the audience. The key here is sharing enough to keep your audience engaged without sharing too much information.
Restaurants (for example) generally showcase their latest menu additions and price points. An online business can showcase deals, discounts, and new dishes too. The main focus is to empower your customers and provide them with the information they need as you try to generate sales.
Social sprout wrote a great article about how to perform social media marketing properly for those interested in learning more.
Content marketing
You need content to showcase the value of your products and services. If you want to attract the attention of your customers, then you should create content that people are interested in reading. Try to focus on content relevant to your industry as this helps Google understand your website. This content can be made up of videos, articles, images, and be on various platforms such as social media and other blogging networks.
Having a content marketing strategy in mind is key here, you want to create content that people are interested in and what brings them to your brand is quality that you would expect when browsing the internet yourself. Once people enjoy and use your content, they will be more likely to pay for products/services you have on offer.
At Sitelabs, we regularly blog and provide SEO and web design insights for small businesses in the hopes that some of our readers end up using our service. There are many reasons to blog on your website but it is only one of the many forms of content marketing.
Some larger companies provide calculators, tools, and even software as content to lure potential clients in.
Email marketing
Email marketing helps you create a list of customers and prospects. You can acquire email addresses from them by offering something in return, such as a free guide or short ebook. Once you obtain the email address, you can use that email list to continue informing customers about deals and any valuable content/products, as that can make a huge difference in the long term.
One downside of email marketing is that Gmail has implemented a strong filter that moves newsletters into the promotion section which made open rates for email marketing much lower.
Conclusion
All of these digital marketing strategies can work so your business should trial them and invest time and money in those that show promise in the form of results. All these tactics should help most businesses generate more leads but some methods work better than others.
There is no silver bullet when it comes to digital marketing. Only hard work, persistence, trial and error will result in a good long term result in getting more visitors and clients for your business.
For those that don’t have the technical ability to implement online marketing strategies, there are always digital marketing specialists (such as Sitelabs), that can help do the heavy lifting for you.
