3 Digital Marketing Strategies Small Businesses Need to Reach More Customers Online

Getting your message seen in the digital space is the hardest challenge any small brand can overcome. With billions (yes, billions) of users surfing Facebook and Google each day, getting your content seen over all the nonsense that exists on the internet poses quite an obstacle. Especially in today’s world, getting your content seen and your message heard is crucial for businesses to grow. Here are 3 strategies small businesses need to adopt if they are going to reach more customers online.

1. Social Media Presence

The first step in establishing a noticeable online presence is going where your customers are. There are 2.3 billion active users on Facebook, so chances are a good portion of your audience will be there. Finding other platforms to leverage will be useful as well, but every small business should have an actively updated Facebook page.

Another profile you’ll need to create is a Google My Business profile, if you don’t have one already. This profile allows you to be discoverable on Google maps, achieve faster SEO, provide more information about your business, create public offers and events, and feature your website to drive more organic traffic. If you don’t have a GMB profile, you’re missing out on a ton of free website traffic and exposure.

When you create your profiles, don’t just post a few things and forget about it for a week. Social media and organic content is an active channel that requires constant nurishment. The second you stop posting consistent content, you lose the opportunity to be found by potential customers and sacrifice your organic traffic to a competitor who will actually value this opportunity for free exposure.

Create a content schedule if it helps, but you should be posting on your social media at least 4 times a week, but no more than 8. Keep your audience engaged by providing value. This can be in the form of “How-To’s” or external articles that are linked to your post. Infographics are top notch for engagement, as long as the statistics outlined in your visual are relevant and useful.

Don’t use your organic content to sell yourself, but you can take the opportunity to inform your audience of what you do. Make a statement about how important a topic is then make the connection to your business. Example: “74% of consumers rely on social media to guide their purchase decisions. That’s why at DM Digital we emphasize the importance of producing valuable, consistent content that engages your audience." Then you could add another line that says “Visit dmdigital.org/social-media to learn more about how we can optimize social media to grow your business.” Personal plugins like this are tolerable once in a while, but don’t overdo it. No more than once every three weeks is a good rule of thumb.

Your social media presence will not only allow your business to become easier to find, but will help you connect with consumers on a more personable level. In fact, on average, consumers who interact with a brand online will spend 20 - 40% more at that business in the long run. Let this illustrate the importance of interacting with your potential customers online and posting consistent content.

There are plenty of other benefits to using social media for your business, as well as plenty of other guidelines you will need to follow to make your social media successful. You can read more on social media in our other blog posts.

2. Paid Ads

I know what you’re probably thinking. Paid ads are expensive, produce little to no results, and your money is better off spend somewhere else. This is all true, if you don’t know what you’re doing that is. Paid ads are the best way to get your content in front of people who would have otherwise never have known your brand even exists. They are also a great way to execute specific goals (gain more website traffic, prospect leads, increase page likes, etc.)

It’s true that paid ads can be expensive, but a wise man once said that it is always better to advertise a little than not at all. Even if you can only spend $5, even $1 a day on ads. Getting your content in front of more eyes is the only way that you can grow, and without paid ads you will have to invest several years (yes, years) into consistent organic content before you start seeing good results.

To put this into perspective, I posted almost daily on my Facebook page (good, quality content) for several months before people started finding my page organically - and I still only have 50 page likes. Granted, page likes are not my number one priority (unlike most businesses), but this just goes to show how much work organic can be.

Can you imagine posting 300+ pieces of content just to be noticed by (insert social media platform here)’s algorithm? Every single day, going in and thinking of something new to post, knowing it’s most likely not going to get any likes. Repeating this process day after day, week after week, month after month, wondering what’s the actual point to all this organic content? Believe me, it’s a grueling process. You will want to give up every couple of weeks, but you can’t because every break you take sets you behind. (Note: break meaning longer than 5 - 7 days).

Paid ads are your only hope for jumpstarting your business and not having to wait several months or years before you finally start to establish your online presence.

Now, there are several different goals you can have for facebook ads, but you’ll have to do some research into what works best for you.

You’ll have to decide which objective best meets the needs for your goal. Reach, awareness, traffic, engagement, and conversions are the most popular.

To learn more about how to make Facebook ads work for your business, listen to our podcast here.

3. Content Marketing

Content marketing is a strategy for driving traffic and increasing your organic exposure by producing quality content that provides value to your audience. No, not providing value through social media. I mean real value, something with substance. These are often manufactured through blogs, podcasts, webinars, guides, etc.

Essentially, you are publishing your knowledge and information with actual value that will benefit readers, in exchange for them visiting your website, signing up with their email, or engaging with your brand in some form. This organic traffic and engagement will allow you to be picked up by Google’s algorithm a lot quicker (same goes for social media), so you can rank higher in search results and increase the likelihood of potential customers finding you on their own.

The more traffic, engagement, content, and quality content you have, the more likely you are to heard in today’s cluttered digital space. So encourage your audience to visit your website, create content they want to read (and benefits them to do so), and you’ll be on your way to establishing a dominant online presence in no time.

It should be noted that since this is another form of organic marketing, it will take extra time and care invested into it before you start seeing results. For reference, it takes an average of 100 podcasts before you can really start to grow. This depends on the quality of course, but I say this to emphasize the amount of effort it will take before you can reap the benefits of your content.

This is another channel of marketing you will have to stay consistent with. I once went a whole month without posting a blog article, and my website traffic and search result ranking went down by 50%. (BIG mistake).

For more content ideas, digital marketing strategies, and guides to success, read our small business marketing blog or listen to our Small Business Owner podcast. Our Free Digital Marketing Guide (The 4 Cornerstones of Successful Digital Marketing) is now available, so contact us to claim your free copy now!