As any business owner will tell you, achieving success is a lot easier said than done. Most people fail to realize just how much competition there is in the world of business.Some new business owners will be very surprised when they see the lack luster results that traditional marketing methods will obtain.Rather than throwing in the towel too soon, you need to think about investing in digital marketing especially, for small business.Digital marketing can offer a variety of benefits for a small business and here are some of them.
1. Digital Marketing Helps to Level the Playing Field
The biggest hurdle that your small or medium sized business will face when trying to market services and products is competing with the corporations who offer similar items. Luckily, digital marketing is the ultimate equalizer when it comes to competing with larger businesses.
A smaller company will be able to garner more attention online by using a reputable digital marketing company and subsequently making their way up the search ranking ladder.
How you ask?
Corporate is soooo slow to make decisions and is often stuck far behind current digital marketing trends.
Back when our company was focused in information technology, I remember working with a large financial company that was still using IE6, while the rest of the world has moved up to IE8. Needless to say, that was a while ago.
Digital marketing and SEO is constantly evolving. You need a partner that can help you innovate.
As a small business, you can get up to speed on new opportunities such as AMP, starting to think about the impacts of voice search, and taking advantage of proper content optimization to show up for rich snippets.
2. Far More Cost-Effective Than Traditional Marketing Methods
Finding capital to invest into traditional marketing methods like trade shows or even direct mail marketing can be a bit hard for a business just starting out. Gartner’s Digital Marketing Spend Report claims that email marketing and social media advertising get results double that of telemarketing and direct mail.
This means that you will be able to spend less on your digital marketing efforts and get better results in the process. To put it another way, traditional marketing is old school, and quite frankly…it sucks.
3. Better Conversion Rates
When investing in digital marketing, you will be able to increase the conversions your website and social media channels provide. Most digital marketers focus heavily on how to best optimize the digital tools you have to increase customer retention and conversions.
Generally, the digital marketing professionals you hire will hone in on increasing sales leads or product sales, turning those leads into subscribers, and then finally selling that product or service to the visitor.
This chain of conversion can be quite lucrative and is something you should put a priority on with your marketing efforts. Paid advertising is the fastest way to see results. I recently achieved a 5000% return on a client’s investment in pay-per-click. This is not a typical result, and your expectation with PPC should be around 300% ROI.
4. Higher Revenues Are Generated From Digital Marketing
The main reason why most people even advertise their products or services is to generate higher revenues for their company. This should be obvious, but many digital marketing companies don’t focus on ROI. Our company does, and knowing your numbers is key to strategy and growth.
A study performed by search engine juggernaut Google found that companies utilizing the power of digital marketing generated revenues that were nearly 3x more than companies using traditional advertising.
Unless you’re a store front that is giving away coupons or discounts on a flyer, I’ve seen traditional marketing flop almost every time. Digital marketing is where you need to be.
5. A More Targeted Approach
When hiring a digital marketing professional, it’s critical you find out who your target audience is and what they are looking for. Using this type of targeted approach will allow you to reach out your audience and provide them with what they need.
This will only increase things like customer satisfaction and retention rates. Knowing who “customer persona” will also help you to avoid wasting time on marketing efforts that are not working.
Streamlining the approach used to reach customers will only benefit your company in the long run.
For example, one of our clients are in weddings. We know their target demographic are women between the age of 25-34.
How did we get this information? Simple. It’s from Facebook Insights on their company page. Make sure your digital marketing efforts target the right customer. This step is critical to your success.
6. Reaching Out to the Mobile Consumer
One of the most telling statistics about adults in the United States is that nearly 91% of them have their mobile devices in reaching distance at all times, even in their bed while they sleep! This means that there is a huge audience when it comes to marketing to mobile users.
Neglecting to address this user with your marketing and advertising efforts means you will be leaving a variety of customers in the dust. Digital marketing targets this user and helps you to convert them into customers. Having things like a mobile or responsive website is a great way to connect with mobile users.
Google has been putting huge initiatives behind mobile search for a long time now, with more than 50% of searches now on mobile devices.
AMP is their most recent push (which I’ve briefly mentioned in #1 above), but Google’s search algorithms have been rewarding mobile optimization since “Mobilegeddon” back in April 2015.
7. It’s All About Building a Brand
In order to sustain growth in any business, you will need to focus on building your brand. While this may seem like an impossible task, with the right digital marketing strategies you will be able to enhance the recognition and reputation your brand has to offer.
The work that you put in regarding the building of your brand is worth it considering just how beneficial it can be when trying to retain loyal customers.
Brand building means thinking like big business. Put your logo on everything! Start a Twitter campaign solely focused on brand building. Or, create and run banner ads with a clear call-to-action of what you offer. Link building, SEO, content marketing, UX, even business networking events. Everything should keep your brand in focus.
When you take your brand seriously, others will too.
8. Earn the Customer’s Trust
Generally, a digital marketer will want to use things like testimonials, reviews, and other social proof when trying to bring attention to your business. Encouraging things like the sharing of your content on social media channels can do wonders when it comes to finding a new customer base.
A recent studay by Nielsen shows that “49% watch live video programming more if it has a social media tie-In” – think elections and trending hashtags on Twitter. I followed the hashtags during the debates and election. It was nuts.
Utilizing the power that satisfied customers have can help you grow and expand the reach you have with ease.
9. Entice Customers to Take Favorable Actions
A crafty digital marketer shouldn’t have much problem getting visitors to take favorable actions like signing up for a newsletter or buying a product. If a person is taking the time to visit your website, they are interested in what you are offering. It does take time to get your message right.
You will need to work with the digital marketing company you have hired to lead the potential customers who visit your website to where they need to be.
Creating great looking landing pages with pertinent information on it is vital when trying to increase conversion rates. And, always with a clear CTA to “request a quote” or other action you want the visitor to take along your well planned customer journey.
10. Essential For Business Survival
Even if your business has a great looking site and active social media pages, without customer conversion it means nothing. Digital marketing agencies will be able to show you the way to converting visitors to your website and social media channels into loyal customers. This is why utilizing the power of digital marketing is essential for the overall success of your business.
Let’s face it. SEO and many other digital marketing tactics have gotten a bad rep. Google’s recent roll-out of Penguin 4.0 has corrected the playing field back in favor of agencies that know what they’re doing, where quality is a top measure of success.
Without effective digital marketing at the forefront of your business decisions, your company will simply be lost.
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