5 Online Marketing Strategies for Small Businesses

You might be wondering why online marketing is important, especially if traditional marketing methods have served you well before.

Because of the number of online users, the primary benefit is reaching a wider audience than you could with traditional marketing.

There are other benefits too, but before we get there let’s go over what online marketing is all about.

Online marketing (or digital marketing) is similar to traditional marketing in that the purpose is to reach more customers and increase brand awareness.

It’s just the methods that differ. Instead of printed ads, you create digital ones.

Instead of handing out flyers, you click the share button on all your social media platforms.

However, it isn’t enough to switch your methods, you’ve got to have strategies in place for optimal awareness and reach.

We’ve established that digital marketing allows you to reach more customers, but what else can it do for your business?

These are some of the benefits of online marketing:

We’re going to look at five strategies every small business should implement to reap these benefits.

Having a strong social media presence is essential for online marketing.

Social media is a good place to find your target audience and connect with them.

Online visibility shows consumers that your brand is reputable and trustworthy.

If they can go to your Facebook page to find out information or check Twitter for a quick review of your product, it’s likely they’ll interact with you which could lead to a sale.

For a small business, a social media marketer would be the most ideal as someone will always be available to interact with your audience.

If that’s out of your reach, you could set aside time every day to spend updating your socials, answering questions, and promoting your brand.

Make sure you’re promoting relevant content regularly and engaging with your target audience.

Although Facebook is the most common platform for marketing, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and Twitter are also effective platforms for boosting traffic to your site or increasing conversions.

Remember to customize your posts to fit each platform’s style.

The platforms you choose will depend on the type of business you have, but it can’t hurt to promote your business anywhere you can!

Email marketing is, without a doubt, a fundamental part of digital marketing.

Emails have been around for decades now, but they’re far from outdated.

Email marketing brings in more conversions than any other digital marketing platform.

It’s also a form of delivering content, but it’s personalized and timeous.

Email marketing campaigns are great for developing relationships with your customers, as well as influencing their purchasing behavior.

Businesses use email marketing to convert leads to customers, and it’s an effective strategy.

Direct communication with your customers helps with customer retention.

Email marketing suits small businesses because everything can be automated using the right tool.

Local SEO gets its own section because it’s especially important for small physical businesses.

Like SEO, local SEO is based on optimizing search engines for your business to have an online presence, but it incorporates location.

Local SEO will give you high rankings for searches associated with your area.

People often search for location-based services, like “gourmet restaurants near me” or “florist in Los Angeles”. You’ll want your business to show up in these searches.

Using Google My Business, a free tool that allows you to build a profile and list your business on Google, you can manage the information that shows up.

Your information should include your business’ physical address, contact number, and a location on Google Maps.

You should also add photos, reviews, and ratings from customers.

Through social media and your website, request for customers to post a review and offer them a reward, like a free product or a coupon.

Before you can implement marketing strategies, you’ve got to identify what you want to achieve.

From marketing itself, are you looking to create brand awareness, expand your online visibility, or increase conversions?

Once you know what you’re aiming for, you can decide which strategies will be the best for you and start implementing them.

While setting out your goals, think about which strategies will have the most impact on your target audience.

You should also identify the strategies that need more effort from you and aim to enhance those strategies.

Digital marketing creates the space for business owners to interact and engage with their customers regularly and directly.

You can find out exactly what your audience’s needs are and discover how to provide solutions.

Get to know your audience’s needs through surveys and initiate conversations on social platforms.

Building a relationship with your audience will show them that you value their opinion. This is what leads to brand loyalty from customers.

A buyer persona is a profile of your ideal customer.

Creating a buyer persona will give you an idea of the type of customer that would be interested in your brand.

It will also help you to customize your website to attract your ideal customers and optimize your keywords to what they might search for.

SEO and social media marketing will require constant attention because you need to update posts and have conversations in real-time.

Content and email marketing can be spaced out, but you’ll still need to dedicate time to them.

One thing that will ease the marketing load is a platform that lets you automate email marketing.

As a small digital or physical business, you should focus on SEO and local SEO.

Use content marketing to educate your audience and customers, and social media marketing and email marketing to promote your content.

Tools like systeme.io can make your marketing life easier by automating features like email marketing.

Remember to cater to your audiences’ needs by getting to know them, and always measure the success of your efforts through analytic tools.