Most small companies find advertising and marketing to be one of the bigger challenges they face. Without the help of a professional, the idea of launching a campaign is daunting. This will require some research, and possibly some outside help. But it’s worth it. A company with poor visibility or bad advertising is only hurting it’s own relevance.
SEO
To get your site on the map and into people’s Google searches, you need good search engine optimization. SEO is built from several web design principles, that all help to make your site as visible as possible. This is an area that you will almost certainly need help in.
Hiring web developers can be expensive; especially if they’re a full-time employee. But you don’t have to pay over the odds. Using sites like freelancer.com, you can outsource your web design and have it handled by a professional. You need to be open to working with people overseas, but that shouldn’t be a big problem, as location isn’t relevant to skill.
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Website
Everyone knows that a good website will always draw in customers, and a bad one will only push them away. But building a website is a task in itself. Most people don’t have the skills to make something like that… or do they? With services like Squarespace and Wix, anyone can build a professional site. Loads of services have become available, offering affordable hosting and easy to use website builders. For the most part, even for E-commerce, drag and drop. So it’s a great solution for anyone techy.
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If you’re not good with computers or don’t have much time to build a website, you can treat it very much like SEO. Using a site like freelancer, you can take away the workload and give your site a personal touch. You won’t be building it, but you’ll have more control over how the site looks. Most web designers will create mockups for a small fee, to give you some direction.
Never let your site get out of date or broken. Make sure that you have friends and family test the site for usability. The biggest gripe you hear about most websites is hard to use navigation.
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Word of Mouth
If you always treat customers in the best manner you can. By showing that you put a lot of effort into satisfying their needs, you will gain a lot of customers through word of mouth. People remember being treated well, and people especially remember being treated badly. Even if it’s bad news you have to give, do it with a smile and treat the customer with respect.
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Social Media
Social Media is your key to free advertising, and you should use it as much as possible. Billions of people use Facebook and Youtube; so posting on those sites gives you the chance to reach out to significant numbers.
Plan ahead when it comes to your social media posts. Prepare posts all at once, to cover a couple of months, and the roll them out as required. This allows you to keep your style consistent and is usually more efficient.
You can use free services, like buffer.com, to automatically make scheduled posts for you. This takes even more of the work off of your shoulders and prevents posting at the wrong time.
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Open Advertising
You don’t have to be a multinational giant to place ads online. In fact, with services like Google Adsense, anyone can afford to advertise. You only pay per click on your ads, so that you never pay for people ignoring your ads. They let you set a budget, and choose how often your ad appears.
Most websites that host adverts use services like this to do it. So you know that your advertising has the biggest footprint possible, while also only being shown to people who will find it relevant. From a lot of business’ perspectives, this makes TV and Radio advertising pointless.
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Digital Service Agencies
It’s unlikely that you’ll be able to accomplish all of this by yourself. So, you’ll need some help. Thankfully, there are products available for just this situation. Companies can handle your entire digital marketing campaign. Including updates to your website and even SEO. Most of these services are bespoke so that they can be tailored to your needs. This saves a little bit, compared to traditional marketing methods.
To find and compare these companies, start with youtube. Search for something like “digital agency intro video,” and look at all of the results. These videos are used to showcase a company’s work, almost like a portfolio. So after watching just a few, you’ll know which companies fit your best.
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Hopefully, this will give you some traction when it comes to getting your digital presence up-to-date. Do your research, and make sure that you only use content that you have permission for.
