Gigi Catalin Neculai - Online Marketing Basics for Small Business
As you might remember not so long ago we had internet connections via a telephone line, we happily browsed our favorite websites waiting oftentimes a couple of minutes for images and long paragraphs with funky fonts and colors to load. Back in those days we did not have many options, for most people the idea of buying online seemed like a 70's sci-fi movie.
Because of the high costs associated with creating a website
in the early ages of the internet, this was a luxury item of larger companies;
it almost felt more as status symbol. Nowadays as you already know many things
have changed.
Today your website is probably one of the best sales tools
your business can have, here's why
It's your best lead generation tool: in today's market even
the smaller companies can compete against the largest companies in the world
for potential customers
It's your most cost effective sales tool: forget newspapers,
yellow books and old media, websites can take orders, accept new customers and
much more 24/7 without having to have anyone waiting on the phone to take an
order
It's a fast marketing testing tool: with a click of a button
you can change products name, prices, pictures, copy and much more to see what
appeals more to your customers, "good luck trying that with a
catalogue"
It's your own retailer and sales person: setting up an
e-commerce website today is not only easy but affordable, your website can take
orders, payments and automatic process the orders and shipping if needed
Understanding online marketing and its process
Yes, your website is probably one of the most important
assets in your online marketing efforts, however its far from being the only
thing you need when creating an internet marketing campaign. Most small
business make the mistake of believing that by just putting a 5 page catalog
website together on the web will bring all the customers they had been waiting
for. In today's competitive marketplace this will rarely ever do anything for
your company.
If you want to create a successful marketing campaign you
have to create and follow a step by step process to run and grow your business
online.
Step 1: Take charge and be consistent
You can achieve online marketing success if you put the time
and dedication to educate yourself about the different online marketing
strategies and take charge of your online efforts. If you put up a website,
Facebook page and twitter account just to leave it alone and never come back to
it, failure will soon follow you and most people blame some obscure evil
internet god, where you think you got too late into the game, that you are not
a 22 year old Harvard genius or that you are just unlucky. Believe me many
people go through this, only to come back years later regretting all the
success they would have had accomplished if they only had stuck with it.
Your online marketing needs a great image: starting from the
colors you choose for your logo and the font you use in your website, your
online marketing message has to be clear. Remember will all the clutter that
most people see on the media everyday oftentimes less is more. Forget the
flying color letters and loud funky music on your website, chances are its just
going to get mixed with the sweet soft online radio station of your customer
and you just made her close her browser as fast as she could. Remember to put
the same creative elements on all your marketing materials as you do in your
website so you can create what is called a business brand.
All about hosting and domains: today millions of domains are
registered every day it's not as easy as it used to be to find a good domain
name for your business, keep in mind that there are many different online
marketing strategies that can be improved by having a good domain name for
example if you have a domain that includes the correct keywords for your
business this will eventually help you with your search engine optimization
efforts. Also keep in mind that hosting is very affordable nowadays back in the
day I remember having friends pay over $50 a month for basic hosting service.
Today you can get a great hosting service with all the necessary tools for your
website at a low monthly cost.
Step 2: Establish your online brand
Website design: Don't be fooled by some of the larger
companies that tell you that web design is an obscure world of code wizards and
design goddesses. With the advances in today's online technologies is fairly
affordable to have a great and effective website designed. Don't take me wrong,
I'm not saying find your 17 year old nephew to design your website as I've seen
before, or to go to craigslist and find that $20 web designer that will create
your online masterpiece, this will shortly result in online marketing failure.
All I'm saying is that you don't have to spend 5 or 7 thousand dollars to get a
very effective and appealing website.
It's all on the content: Don't follow the same error of many
small business owners when they start creating a website where they put all the
time and energy finding the right colors, the perfect logo on all the awesome
images for the website but they neglect to create the best copy and content for
their customers to read, after all most people go online to find useful information.
Not only this but shortly when you discover the wonders of search engine
optimization you will rapidly find that the content on your website is a key
factor in your online marketing efforts. If you don't feel as creative as you
were in your junior high poetry writing class, i highly recommend finding
someone who can help you create compelling content for your site.
Communicate your offer: Many companies get distracted and
use their website as a tri-fold brochure. Make sure you find the single reason
why someone will visit your site and clearly give your visitors what you have
to offer. It could be a simple contact form for more information, a sales video
or a well put together sales page with an integrated online payment, whatever
it is make sure you clearly tell your prospective customers what you offer and
what action you want them to take.
Step 3: Build your audience
I could literally write 10 books in this subject and will
definitely give you more detailed information later on, but this is how some
say "where the magic happens", here is where you could give up to
have the best designed website, all the social media pages in the world and so
forth if no one is finding you online there is just no point of losing your
precious time and money on these internet adventures. Traffic=customers=sales
Search engine optimization: SEO or search engine
optimization is probably one of the most important pieces of the online
marketing puzzle. This is where if done correctly can take your business from a
small pop and mom corner shop to a large online retailer. Basically millions of
people search every day for services and products online trough search engines,
SEO is what helps you beat the competition so more people will find you.
Social media: If by now you don't know what Facebook or
twitter is you must have been living under a rock for the past 5 years. As you
know today almost everyone is connected online with their friends, family and
colleagues trough some social media site. You need to take advantage of this by
creating a social media campaign, just as I explained earlier about web design,
you won't do much by just putting up a Facebook or Google+ profile, you have to
create a strategy to reach all those potential customers with which you can
easily interact online.
Paid online advertising: Just as important as some other
online marketing methods paid online ads can be a very effective sales tool.
Between Google Adwords, Facebook and banner ads there are plenty of companies
looking for you to spend your beloved dollars advertising with them, make sure
that before you take your shiny credit card out of your wallet you analyze and
understand where your money is going and how is it going to help your online
marketing efforts.
There are plenty of other online marketing strategies to
follow, for now I wanted to cover some of the most important basics that will
hopefully guide you on the right direction. Please keep tuned for more tips and
information to help you create or enhance your small business online marketing
campaigns.
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