Why digital services are important for your business?

There is no doubt that technology is transforming the way we live and work. Every aspect of our everyday lives is backed by technology in some way or the other. When we talk about technology, the continuous growth of social media platforms cannot be overlooked.

Introduction

There is no doubt that technology is transforming the way we live and work. Every aspect of our everyday lives is backed by technology in some way or the other. When we talk about technology, the continuous growth of social media platforms cannot be overlooked. In today's digital age, social media platforms are backed by digital marketing practices.

Various social media platforms help new businesses and brands to market themselves and interact with their audience instantly without any delay or hindrance. Thanks to various media tools of social media marketing, it has become more easier to discover the tastes and preferences of your target audience.

Unlike conventional marketing practices, social media marketing is less expensive and caters to a wider audience. Earlier, newspapers, radio and television were used to market and promote your product or services.

However, the two major drawbacks of using conventional ways of marketing was the fact that they were more time consuming than digital marketing and could not reach to a selected target audience of a brand.

Also, the overall building of a brand or business is less expensive and can be digitally enhanced by using free online logo designing apps and softwares. Whether your brand is relatively new or has been around for a longer period of time, if you are not using a proper marketing strategy, then it is possible that your business has been losing a significant amount of potential buyers, customers, partners or investors.

Contrary to the general perception, the planning and implementation of an effective marketing strategy is not as hard as it seems. Some businesses have already started to grow by shifting to digital marketing, whereas some brands are still skeptical about the future and benefits of digital marketing. Following are some major benefits of adopting an effective digital media strategy.

Why Create a Website for your Small Business?

Your website is the key to everything, it is a must to have a presence online that you control and can divert users to.  Two thirds of small businesses have a website and 81% of shoppers research online before buying.

You can either use a website builder to do it yourself or get a web design agency to do it for you.  Here are the pro's and con's of website builders vs having one professionally made.

Even if it's just a brochure, having a professional website builds trust with your potential customers.  It's the foundation of your online presence, allowing you to link back to it and showcase your services and products.

75% of people have judged a company’s credibility based on its website design

Blue Corona

Reaching to a Wider Audience

Digital marketing involves the promotion and brand awareness of a company's goods and services through digital platforms. You can use the internet as a powerful medium to market your brand locally and internationally as well.

You need to reach a wide audience to generate regular sales or leads.   We tend to measure the likely amount of sales or leads, based on the websites traffic using a "conversion rate". 

A conversion rate is the average percentage of website visitors who complete a desired goal.  This could be contacing you by phone or email or buying a product in your online store.

Your likely conversion rate is depends on the channel you decide to use for your digital marketing.  For example, organic rates much higher thank social media or paid ads.  It also varies depending what industry you are in.

For more information, Webfx have a great article on what is a good conversion rate.

Of course, you can hire a Digital Marketing Agency to promote your business online.  The smart way to do this is to ensure you have a solid Digital Marketing RFP to help you find the right agency.

Use of Social Media Sites/Apps

There are several digital marketing tools that can be opted for planning an effective marketing strategy. For example, different social media apps such as facebook, instagram and twitter can be used to market your brand in different parts of the world.

There are a lot of social channels which vary depending on their goal.  For example Tiktok is video based, Instagram is mainly photo or video and Twitter is for short text snippets.

Consider which channel you are posting on and what that audience will want to see on that social site.

Many companies release their own apps to provide modern services as well as added brand awareness and recognition due to the popularity of the app software market. Building your own app can be tricky to say the least... there are plenty of mobile app developers  that can help bring your idea to life and ensure that it works swimmingly on both mobile and web application. 

If you are going down the route of launching your own app then a key to success is transmitting strong branding and being creative with your brand awareness through every facet of the app. Specialist agencies work tirelessly in ensuring your branding is distinctive within your operating field, so if you would like to learn more then visit here. 

The UK has 53million active users on social media

statista.com

Benefits of Email Marketing

Email marketing is comparatively an older yet very effective means of online marketing to interact with people of all ages and backgrounds. Unlike social media apps that primarily caters to a younger audience, email marketing is a more better option for such businesses who wish to market their goods and services to an older demographic online.

Search Engine Marketing

One of the most useful digital marketing tools include SEM (search engine marketing). It is an amalgamation of paid search and search engine optimisation (SEO).

What are these two options?

SEO

Search Engine Optimisation is the process of improving the number of people arriving at your website by improving it's visibility on search engines. 

This is organic or unpaid traffic meaning you don't pay for every single visit to your website.  SEO takes time to take effect, but once you achieve a good position in the search engines you can hold onto it with ongoing work and really reap the benefits of being there.

Paid Search

Paid Search is a form of advertising where you can appear in the search results of a search engine such as Google or Bing, but every time someone clicks on your link you pay for that click.

Paid Search can be very flexible - you can turn ads on and off and the results are almost instantaneous.  However there is no lasting effect, if you want to stop paying for ads you will disppear completely from the search engines results, meaning your visibility is gone.

In many cases, SEO and PPC work best when integrated and strategically aligned.

searchengineland.com

Maintaining direct communication with your clients

With the help of digital marketing tools, it's easier and quicker to maintain direct communication with your clients and sponsors. This also helps to strengthen the relation of trust between you and your audience.

Clients will enjoy hearing from you and it is reassuring to see an active business on social media and email.  If you haven't worked with a client for a while and don't ever use digital channels to communicate with them, they may even forget your exist when they are next looking to buy.

Knowing the demographics of your competitors brands

By following an effective digital marketing strategy, you can create awareness of your brand among your desired target customers while having complete information about the demographics of your competitor's audience as well.

It's easy to look at what your competitors are doing online and how well they are doing it.  Not many ideas are new and it's great to do competitor research to get ideas from your competitiors for your Ads, blog article, content, products and services etc.

Use of relevant SEO practices

Through using the right type of marketing analytics tools, it is possible to make sure that your marketing content reaches your desired audience.  By following relevant and updated SEO practices, it's possible to connect with such customers online who are viewing content or purchasing goods and services that are similar or interlinked with the services offered by your company.

Stay up to date by reading the latest marketing blogs to see what larger companies are doing.  They have big resources and can afford to experiment and show proven results.

Search Engine Marketing

Today the internet is everywhere. One can easily use the internet to shop online or look for a particular service. Since, your potential client already has access to the internet, it is possible that they might be searching for a service similar to yours and may opt for another brand or vendor since your online presence is not as frequent as required by businesses of your niche.

Sometimes it's really suprising what people search for online.  Remember different users will behave in different ways.  Young people and busy professionals may choose to shop online whereas older generations are more likely to come and visit a physical shop - in some situations!  Every business is different, you should try and research how each of your target demographics are behaving...

Collect data and assess what's happening

For no charge, you can install Google Analytics on your website which has a wealth of information about your visitors and how they are interacting with your website.

Of course, there is so much there it is quite overwhelming at first, so here is an article with some things you can easily check to understand your websites' users better.

Working on your online presence

If a person plans to buy your goods and services, the first thing she will do is search online for reviews and other information related with your goods and services.

9 out of 10 consumers read reviews before making a purchase.

oberlo.com

If your online presence does not meet the standards set by your rival brands, it is possible that users will not be interested in your brand or the services that you provide.

So if your rivals are show trust signals like customer reviews, you need to start collecting and presenting your own reviews as soon as you can.

Oberlo.com also say that 62% of consumers won't buy from brands that censor their online reviews.

Conclusion

Not many businesses can ignore digital these days.  Even if you are on the high street, digital services will still deliver a lot of business to your door.

But, like with everything, you can still waste money if you neglect something important or blow your budget on the wrong things.

Having a professional review your marketing, website or SEO is still worthwhile so you get the foundation right before increasing your online spend.

Sources

• https://www.bluecorona.com/blog/29-small-business-digital-marketing-statistics/
• https://www.webfx.com/blog/marketing/what-is-a-good-conversion-rate/
• https://www.statista.com/topics/3236/social-media-usage-in-the-uk/#dossierKeyfigures
• https://searchengineland.com/seo-vs-ppc-pros-cons-integrated-approach-274643#:~:text=There%20are%20two%20key%20differences,a%20cost%20for%20each%20click.
• https://www.oberlo.com/blog/online-review-statistics#:~:text=54.7%20percent%20of%20consumers%20read,negative%20reviews%20within%20a%20week.