Any small business trying to make its mark on the internet really has to fight to try hard to get noticed. It’s a no brainer that marketing is required, however in order to stand out from the crowd and really draw attention to what you do you need to be much cleverer about the way you go about your marketing efforts. This is why it’s important to be strategic about your online marketing for small business.
Although there are several elements to consider when putting together an online marketing for small business plan of attack, perhaps the most important factor is that you need to have a clear idea of what you want to achieve from you campaign. This will be something different for every business, but may be along the lines of:
- More Blog visitors
- Increased number of Leads
- Higher number of referrals from other sites
- Increase awareness of your new product line.
Whatever your desired outcome, focus on how you will achieve that and break that process into smaller steps.
Be strict with yourself and incorporate timescales. No marketing campaign, let alone a campaign promoting online marketing for small business, will be successful if it is just allowed to roll on and on indefinitely. Without timescales you aren’t putting yourself under any pressure to monitor the performance of the campaign. If results aren’t looking favourable you might say “let’s give it another week”, instead of accepting that the campaign has run its course and it’s time to try something new.
Think about how your brand appears as a whole across the various online platforms you may be using. If you have a website or blog, it’s a good idea to make sure you use the same colour scheme or theme on sites such as LinkedIn or Facebook. It means that when people want to check out other things that you are doing, they know instantly that they are looking at your pages. If you’ve ever looked up any household name companies on Facebook for example you’ll notice that they’ll have customised their page to look like it could be at home on their regular business website.
Any discussion of marketing ideas for small businesses that work would not be complete without mentioning Social media in more detail. It isn’t just about making sure your page looks great and ties in with your brand image, it’s about using social platforms to humanise your brand and stay in touch with the people who will ultimately drive your profits forward – your customers.
Ultimately, online marketing for small business should be a great way for you to increase the visibility of your brand across multiple sites, and in front of a far bigger audience than you would get via any other form of marketing such as door to door, print or telemarketing.