Building an online presence for your new business can be time consuming and sometimes frustrating. All the same, as entrepreneur Tony Freeman knows all too well, it is also incredibly important. Building a presence online is not something that just happens overnight, but it is a vital way of helping people to find, interact with, like and trust you.
The good news is, building your presence on the internet becomes a whole lot less frustrating once you know where to start.
Your online presence is the sum of the identities you have created. This can relate to your business and to you as a person, supporting the interactions and relationships you've already established. Your presence online has a broad reach, creating brand awareness and gaining new leads, followers and, ultimately customers, where it is built diligently.
Where to begin in building the online presence of your business?
As Tony Freeman will agree, there is a lot that goes into building a business's online presence, from building websites and online profiles to developing strategies to encouraging engagement and interaction across the various web-based platforms.
#1 Strategise
What are your goals? You must look at this first and foremost, both on a short and long term basis. As your business's online presence begins to grow, you should examine how every online effort is helping your business towards its goals. It is a good idea to keep written records for easy referral to make sure that online strategies are taking the business forward.
#2 Build a Platform
Building a solid platform, for most entrepreneurs and small businesses, means building a website. Your site is your hub: a centralised location people can visit to learn more about what you do. Here they should be able to see what you have to offer, have the opportunity to engage and interact with you and, of course, contact you.
It's important to be clear and concise on your business website, letting the world know what you're all about. Easy to use navigation is a must. A free giveaway is an excellent strategy - providing the visitor with valuable information or special offers - in exchange for their email address.
#3 Provide Value
Whether it's through the business website, an online community you're involved in, or through social media, it's important that the content you provide offers consistent value. What can you offer the people you interact with? What can you give them that's of genuine value? It might be an informational video, blog post or podcast. It might be a reply to a question in a forum. Whatever the form, you should ensure that your contribution offers consistently valuable content to help you gain authority and credibility in your industry. Engaging with online communities and providing valuable assistance can be a great method of achieving growth of your business's online presence. So far as social media websites are concerned, a good rule of thumb is the 80/20 ratio. 80% of the time, you're sharing other peoples' content, 20% of the time, you're posting your own. This way you begin to build up a rapport, rather than appearing too spammy. This tactic not only builds trust with followers (showing that you're not there to shamelessly self-promote) but helps you to build working relationships with others in your industry. It's a great method of attracting new followers.
#4 SEO
SEO, or Search Engine Optimisation, is an ever-adapting science, as Tony Freeman understands all too well. Nevertheless, thousands of free SEO advice articles are available online, helping those starting out to keep up-to-date with SEO best practices. Google's Keyword Tool is invaluable in helping you to decide which keywords to target in your content. It will give you an approximate calculation of how many times a search term is inputted into Google per month, plus give you an idea of the quantity and quality of competition for those keywords, and even suggest alternatives.
You must continue to update and improve your website if you want it to rank well. At the very beginning, your content will probably be all you have to offer your first visitors. Continue to seek out ways to improve your website, optimising it for search engine purposes as you go.
#5 Tweet
Once upon a time, Twitter was just used by people to interact with their families and friends; letting them know what they were up to in 140 characters or less. Times have changed. Twitter is embraced by millions of businesses internationally for the value it provides as a social marketing tool, allowing retailers to connect with customers each and every day. Many corporations use Twitter as a marketing tool, publishing announcements and news, promoting special offers and getting real-time feedback from their customers.
#6 Google Business Centre
Adding your business to Google Business Centre means that it will appear on Google Maps - a huge plus in helping customers to find you. Additionally, it will boost your business in terms of Google search rankings. Google is the world's leading search engine with millions of visitors a day. Just visit the Google Business Centre for instructions on adding your business to the Google business directory.
#7 Keep Learning
New tactics, technology and information flood the online information market each and every day. It's worth taking the time and effort to stay on top of new trends in what can be a fast paced business. To stay ahead of the curve, stay educated.
No comments:
Post a Comment