DIY makeover tips for small business with digital marketing

Internet is the new marketplace.

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If your business is not on the internet, then your business will be out of business. -Bill Gates

Ignoring online marketing is like opening a business but not telling anyone.

Google only loves you when everyone else loves you first. -Wendy Piersall

Reach, don't preach: Digital marketing is simply putting your customers first.

Invest yourself. This is the best investment you can make in any business.

{These verses are extracted from the sacred scriptures found in the mines of digital age.}

Since you are still reading this, somewhere you might have strings attached with few heroic words embedded in the title of this blog. Isn’t it?

Agree?

Tired of implementing same business tactics to attract customers? Is your business lacking that charm which is fading your online presence? Invest few seconds and think.

Okay! Time-up.

You might have a well-furnished website. But is it generating adequate traffic?

Also, you have made accounts on all social media platforms but are you consistent? Is your networking proportionately growing with digits?

And you even registered your business on Google but are you listed on the top? Are you visible on the first page of Google?

In such a highly competitive market, the need of the hour is to stand out of the crowd and make your business look extraordinary.

Reaching potential customers is another splitting headache.

A brand is worthless if it doesn’t connect with the right audiences in a relevant way.

Now how can you make customers walk to your doorstep when they step out in the internet market while looking for a product or service?

The easiest solution for all your dilemmas is ‘Marketing’.

Doing business without advertising is like winking at a girl in the dark.

The heart of any business success lies in its marketing.

And!

The best marketing doesn’t feel like marketing.

Marketing is like a beauty contest in which businesses are judged by customers and the most tempting, attractive and quality-driven contestant wins.

If your business isn’t eye-catching, there are fair chances of getting dumped by the customers in just initial levels.

So what’s the best solution to avoid being the victim of rejection?

A Makeover!

Yes! It’s high time to give your business a makeover. So what are you waiting for?

Hold on! Before you start dreaming about your new business look.

What’s your budget? Running low on money these days?

Cheer up! Most of the small businesses in present scenario are in the same boat. But a dominant advantage which small businesses enjoy over large or medium businesses is the availability of countless opportunities for their growth with a small marketing strategy.

Most of the marketing tactics aka makeover ingredients out there are expensive and fancy. Buzzwords like Google Adwords and Facebook Campaigns may pain your ears and pockets too in search of maximum results and conversions.

Thus, after delving deep into the ocean of digital marketing, I have come up with a few but valuable pearls which would change the whole look of your business. Trust me, you will be flaunting the resulting tinge of business success on the internet within just a few weeks.

Here is a series of easy and affordable DIY makeover tips for your business using digital marketing tactics.

1. Pen down your business targets

This may seem boring but is the most important step in developing any future plan. And if it is about your business, fill out every page of your notepad with your dreams.

Setting targets will narrow down your diversified attention and will make you focus your efforts on most important and urgent tasks to be worked upon.

Like you are having low budget then you should have all your focus in creating brand awareness, engaging visitors, generating leads and lastly converting leads into sales.

If you are expecting instant results then set short-term goals. The period of obtaining end results may vary from 10 days to three months. But if you are expecting long-term results then plan your strategies accordingly.

Just make it clear what targets you want to achieve.

2. Develop Buyer Persona for your target audience

If you are associated with any kind of business, you might be aware of the term ‘Buyer Persona’.

If not, pay attention!

Buyer Persona is a representation of your ideal customer’s preferences based on market research and real data about your existing customers.

Seems Complicated? Well, trust me. It isn’t.

Buyer Persona tells you exactly what a buyer is thinking while making a decision for buying the products, services or solutions that you market.

Now since you are trying to attract new customers on the internet, the possibilities are quite literally endless, but trying to market to everyone is nearly impossible, and that’s why you need a buyer persona.

Well, Buyer Persona is a quiet voluminous term to confine and it's like impossible to touch all its aspects in this blog. So I just penned down five solid reasons to incorporate Buyer Persona in your business makeover to-do list.

Detailed Buyer Insight

Targeted Marketing

Positioning Strategy

Better Quality Leads

Conversion Optimization

In a nutshell, this is the most important step to execute before showcasing your brand to the world and reaching the doorstep of your potential customers.

3. Optimize Your Website for Mobile

Consumer behavior is changing! You must adapt!

Guess what! Google itself is alerting you.

Do you know 60% of all the website traffic emerges from mobile devices?

That means your website can no longer afford not to offer a sharp, responsive mobile experience.

The need of the hour is to optimize your website for best user experience featuring faster loading, synchronized with Google algorithms and best responsive design.

Well, I mentioned the algorithm change in Google here because of a reason.

If you’re confident that your website and blog will look great on mobile devices and that Google’s algorithm change won’t hurt your search listings than your whole business life was a lie.

The algorithm change is witnessable.

Google brings those websites at the surface of search engine that serves information directly in the plate of users exactly what they ordered.

Google obviously won’t send mobile users to websites that provide a frustrating browsing experience that can make users suspect their belief in Google in providing helpful and relevant content immediately.

So how to make Google deny your rejection? Simple!

A mobile-friendly website!

But not only this would not be helpful. You must beautify your responsive website with the ornament of mobile marketing.

Mobile Marketing not only gives your business a ravishing look but also give you access to more customers and exposure to the market trends and help you grow accordingly.

If your site wasn’t prepared for mobile before, don’t worry!

Do it right now and reach every niche of this huge market of the internet.

4. Start Blogging

The efforts invested in your business makeover will surely take a turn for the best with the implementation of content marketing in the procedure.

Nothing can beat your business with these three victory tactics in the game of digital marketing.

Magic art of writing, magic spell of keywords and magic potion of SEO!

All the ingredients can be mixed together in the bowl of blogging with the spatula of keyword research and lastly can evenly be spread on the infinite surface of the internet.

Around 70% of business owners plan to invest in content marketing.

Undoubtedly Content Marketing is unbeatable.

It’s not the best content that wins, it’s the best-promoted content. - Andy Crestodina

In previous years, it was horrible to think about investing a huge amount in advertising.

However, the present scenario is very different.

You may not even require spending a single penny on content marketing and yet you can be in good books of Google.

All you need to do is play with your keywords to optimize your content for SEO, and stay consistent to be in ‘The Game of Google Searches’.

Tip: You can even ping industry influencers to contribute posts and share with their communities to get more exposure.

5. Master SEO Basics

The buzzword of the century, SEO!

Every second around 24 blogs post published on Google. The moment you saw this blog, clicked the link, started reading and reached this point of the article, by the time around 7350 blog posts were catered to Google.

Can you see the extent of competition?

And how many of those blog posts appear on the front page of Google?

Maximum 10!

Wooaah! Out of the million results, your content should be so extraordinary to make your place among the top ten search results.

And this is how SEO comes in the scenario.

Search Engine Optimization is the process of optimizing your online content so that a search engine likes to show it as a top result for searches of a certain keyword.

Got the key for Google limelight?

Also, this key is free and unpaid! Now imagine how many bucks you might have for paid advertising to get your business on Google's top list which can be done without spending a single penny.

You don't need to be a technical wizard for making this magic happen. Just follow these simple and useful tips and gets wings to your business.

Backlinking

One of the easiest Organic SEO Tips is to be sure you have strong URLs. Make sure that your page URL is one of your key terms mentioned on that page. In WordPress, these are termed as Permalinks.

Perfect On-Page Optimization

Well, so many local businesses aren't aware of the need of On-page Optimization. They either ignore it or do it incorrectly.

Though large-scale SEO efforts for websites like content marketing and linking building are mandatory one should not ignore On-page Optimization.

It deals with the aspects of a given web page that influence search engine rankings.

Examples of on-page optimization include actual HTML code, meta tags, keyword placement and keyword density.

Adequate Keyword Density

Sprinkle keywords throughout your content but within healthy limits. Do not zone out with keyword stuffing or you'll get in trouble because Google will blacklist you.

Social Media Interaction

Google loves socialization.

And it is one of the best ways to pull traffic to your website organically.

Google loves to watch those social media icons on your website linked out to social sites actually.

Next, you need to generate great content and make your audience stay engaged with it. Ideally, your audience will share your content, comment about it, and give you feedback. All of this activity drives traffic and calls attention to your web presence.

Monitoring Performance

Now after you have applied all the above-mentioned tactics, it's time to constantly monitor your and determine whether or not your SEO efforts are paying off.

Not only do you need to be monitoring your rankings but you need to dive deep into your analytics and determine which efforts are producing the most conversions.

6. Build, Target and Grow Your Email List

Do you know email marketing is considered one of the most effective ways to glamorize your business?

Why?

Because it is easy and cheapest to set up.

Further, it doesn’t require the use of any new technology and software.

Who’s targeted?

Mobile customers!

Yes.  Up to 75% of emails are read on mobile.

With the explosion of the mobile era, businesses have not only rethought their email strategy but also optimized their campaigns according to users.

Even now if you hadn’t adopted any email marketing strategy, run and look for one.

Well, I have served some quick tips here for email marketing. Throw a glance!

1. Create an easy-to-find, easy-to-use email signup page on your website.

2. Gather emails in person from your customers.

3. Leverage social media to grow your email list.

4. Leverage every piece of paper your business produces and shares with customers.

5. Don’t let website visitors go without a plea.

6. Gamify your email-gathering efforts and engage customers.

7. Inspire signups with a free, must-have tool.

8. Grow and improve your list by polling current subscribers.

Note: Remember that an email marketing list is a living thing - it should grow and change over time as your business builds strong relationships with new and existing customers. Thus, keep updating your marketing strategy to help your business grow parallelly.

7. Boost PR Online

Even time could not deny that the popularity and fame showered by the press are beyond imagination.

As the very first line of this article says - Internet is the new marketplace, it has been inevitable that the civilization of advertising migrated from offline to online.

Only the medium of approach has changed. Then was traditional marketing but now the torch has been handed to digital marketing.

Want to know how traditional PR got defeated by digital PR in recent years? Let’s count on fingers the demerits of traditional PR which were fixed by a better solution extracted from the application of digital PR.

Exact metrics on audience reach are difficult to track.

Long-lead-time by print publications

Delayed outreach results

More expensive

Limited Information

Now since we have seen the darker side of traditional marketing, it’s time to hook-up with digital marketing and have a glimpse what made the latter dominate the former one.

Employs measurable digital tactics

Short-lead time by social media platforms

Instant results with Influencer outreach

Affordable and in budget

Unlimited information by Web pages

Hopefully, till now you might have got an idea that PR these days is no longer limited to just connecting with journalists and media. Social Media Channels, Industry Influencers, Online Advertisements and Digital Campaigns are the new revolutionaries building modern public relations in the new marketplace.

8. Influencer Outreach

Ever dreamt of making your brand so popular that every consumer have your brand name on the tip of their tongues when asked for product or service recommendation by other consumers.

Or imagine a situation that somehow by just single magic spell a lustrous limelight was showered on your business identity and everybody is just talking about you in the market overnight. Yes, this can be possible in reality too. Here enter Social media influencers into the scene.

Social Media Influencers and Brand Evangelists are the new artists portraying digital landscape with their vast social networks and skillful influential tactics. These influencers speak about your products and give peer-like reviews which helps push a brand’s message unlike traditional PR ever could.

Influencer Outreach ensures long-term sustainability. This strategy is one of the most appropriate strategies for relationship development, link building, and content promotion. Moreover, it assists your brand exchange value with industry influencers and accelerates your awareness of future trends.

9. Viral Your Best Posts

Who doesn't want their content to get viral? Well, everybody does! Isn't it?

Every business wants their reputation and popularity grow dramatically. Now, what's the tactic to make your wish turn into action?

Obviously, not all posts get viral and earn appreciation like the most desirable ones. And there’s no magical formula or discernible pattern to make a post viral. The epic ones have certain features or elements. And your content should make human psychology boil.

If you would have asked Google a few years ago, “What makes things go viral?” you will be served with a simple answer: It’s luck. Actually, no one can predict what content will go viral. It is just similar to buying a lottery ticket.

However, the whole world is sustaining on hacks then why not digital marketing?

Compelling content hinges on one key detail: its shareability. Sharing a post on a facebook page or tweet every once in a while is not enough. Facebook and Twitter are just technologies and we have to strategize activities on them to flatter our brand in the market.

I’ve put together 10 ways to make your best posts go viral (and trust me none of them involve buying a lottery ticket!)

1. Keep your content short such as videos span shall range from 30 secs to 1 minute. The same goes for blogs. Embed your blog content with images, dot points, and subheadings.

2. Create posts which your audience can relate to their own lives ultimately making them more shareable.

3. Go interactive! If you have expert knowledge on any interesting subject, share it with the world by generating interactive content such as quizzes.

4. Produce a compelling headline and captions for your posts.

5. Use viral marketing tools like Untorch.

6. Monitor websites which upload most trending content in case you need some post-creation inspiration on the internet. For example,

What’s Trending

The Verge

Trend Hunter Business

Popurls

Trends24

Snip.ly

Closure

You know, the best thing about digital marketing is that it doesn’t dig deep into your pockets and brings out the best results in your business.

If you are a small venture, just blindly invest your efforts in the above-mentioned ways.

Instead of affording the luxury of spending tens of thousands of rupees/dollars in any digital marketing agency or other marketing methods, look for smarter and cheaper options. You need to work smarter not harder.

With proper and careful planning, lay out a digital marketing plan and witness the difference within few weeks.