These days, if your business isn't online, it's off the radar of your consumers. The best way to grab the attention of digital-savvy consumers is by adopting internet marketing strategies that use the power of the web to drive sales.
Click through to learn about five core internet marketing strategies for small business owners that you can start employing today.
Organic search engine optimization
This type of search engine optimization (SEO) involves organically boosting the search engine ranking of a business website to maximize traffic to the site. The algorithms that search engines use to rank websites constantly evolves. But there are many proven SEO techniques you can use to optimize your search engine ranking.
For example, you can provide in-depth website content and embed relevant search keywords in your content. Additionally, you want to maintain an optimal website structure that search engine "crawlers" can easily index.
Don't have the expertise on your staff to improve your site search engine ranking? Consider hiring SEO professionals on a temporary or long-term basis to take over the responsibility.
Paid search advertising
Even with organic SEO, it's not easy to get your website to rise to the top of the search engine result pages (SERPs) for the keywords associated with your business. Herein lies the value of paid search advertising. This strategy entails buying ads from search engines like Google or Bing. Thereby, appearing as sponsored search results that appear at the top of SERPs for relevant keywords associated with your business.
You as the advertiser will pay the search engine on either a cost-per-impression (CPM) basis after the ad loads on a page a set number of times. Or on a cost-per-click (CPC) basis every time a user clicks the ad.
Content marketing
Delivering original, value-added content is an essential component of SEO and a necessity to attract and retain your audience. For example, the content provided could be short or long-form blog articles, whitepapers, case studies, e-books, infographics or videos.
Whatever you provide, keep it broadly relevant to your business niche. Moreover, keep it fresh with regularly added content while staying within the tone of your brand. For example, if you run a financial services business, ensure your web content is informative but not didactic. If you run a handmade goods business, you have more room to be playful and personable. Plus, providing meaningful content that connects readers to your brand.
Creating and maintaining a profile on today's top social media platforms is all but required in a landscape in which 71 percent of buyers who had a positive brand experience through social media said they would recommend the brand to others, according to Ambassador. But if you don't have the time or staff to regularly post business offerings and deals on every major social platform, you'll need to invest your resources in those platforms that your target audience frequents the most.
For example, the Pew Research Center tells us that 71 percent of 18 to 24 year-olds use Instagram, which might make the photo-sharing platform a valuable platform for a small business that sells college dorm room accessories. Likewise, Pinterest is more popular with women than with men. A fact that makes the decision of which platform to invest in as the owner of a women's clothing business something an obvious one.
Mobile marketing
"Mobile first" is not simply a mantra for designing websites in an era of smartphone ubiquity; it's also a strategy for marketing to consumers who increasingly rely on a smartphone or tablet as their first (and in some cases only) digital point of connection to the outside world.
Mobile internet marketing strategies for small business take this paradigm shift into consideration. They include everything from offering mobile-friendly website designs to users of small-screen devices to text message marketing programs that send subscribed users promotions that boost sales.
