Top 5 Small Business Website Marketing Tips
If your running a smaller business ( as opposed to a major blue chip organisation) then here are my top 5 favourite small business website marketing tips to help you get better results with your website:
1: New content is required frequently and consistently to build search engine presence.
One of the most reliable ways to show up in Google results is to create news content about the topics your customers care about. Now this content should match a number of key criteria. These include being unique – so don’t go copying other content that’s already on the web. The content should ideally be authoritative and useful so that a reader will gain something from the article.
This means that an article will need to be substantive i.e. have a good volume of content. Now I’m not talking words for words sake, or spammy but write so that it can be easily read. It appears as if 300 to 500 words as a minimum is seem as being useful content. So next time you rush to post a one paragraph article thin about how you could make it more informative.
Important Note: For small businesses you need to understand “Direct Response Marketing”. If you have previously undertaken a marketing course or class at college then it is likely that you will have learnt about theoretical marketing models, big business branding and institutional advertising. All of which are perfect for corporations with multi-million dollar advertising budgets. I would suggest that as a small business you need to follow the rules of direct response marketing to be sure you get measurable, trackable results.
2: Consider your website as a lead generation machine
If you have an ecommerce website then its purpose is to make online sales. The purpose of most other websites is to capture leads ( not to make sales). So every single page on the website should have a clear purpose around capturing leads, at a minimum an email address, in an ideal world email, name and telephone.
Once you understand the purpose of your website you can start to ensure that the site is designed accordingly. Strong calls to action, sign up boxes, incentives / encouragements, downloads are typical site mechanisms. Additionally live chat and pop ups can provide a stimulus for action from the visitor.
Important note: Measurement and Testing are two critical activities that must be completed regularly with web marketing. When set up correctly tracking and analysis is far easier with web marketing compared to other forms of online marketing. If you haven’t got Google Analytics set up on your website yet, then make sure you do this immediately. Google Analytics can only track information once installed and cant show data retrospectively. Be sure you’re constantly measuring what you’re doing for best results. Testing should be conducted on pages that receive higher traffic volumes. That way you will have a higher volume of data in order to more accurately establish the impact / effect of any changes.
3: Get Proactive with Social Media and Email
Now when I use the term “website marketing” what I mean from a marketing perspective is everything that happens online. Your website is the one online element for which you have complete control, therefore it makes sense to direct social media elements to the website where possible. The same applies to your email marketing.
For B2B businesses Email marketing is still one of the most effective methods of stimulating sales. Email addresses gained through your website activities should be added into your CRM system and segmented accordingly. Email campaigns should be created using one of the many Email tools that are available (Mailchimp / Send in Blue / Auto Pilot App / Sender / Benchmark Email / Mailerlite / Constant Contact etc). These allow well styled HMTL emails to be created. The email should have links directly to specific landing pages on your website.
When your prospects aren’t using Google, receiving email from you (assuming you have captured their email address) they’re using Facebook, Twitter, LInkedIn, Pinterest, Instagram, YouTube, SnapChat, Whats App, Tumblr, Tik Tok, Viber etc. You need a presence on at least one of these networks. Ideally, you should be updating your social media profile several times each week and linking them to your website.
Important note: With email marketing make sure you use the analytics packages and split testing capabilities to see how your email campaigns can be improved
4: Your website is never finished
With web marketing one of the first things that you need to understand is that your website is never completed. This can be a difficult rationale for many to come to terms with. Developing a companies website can consume a huge quantity of time and effort. Writing copy, finding images etc. So once a website is completed its often convenient to think that this specific marketing activity is completed.
Unfortunately this isn’t the case, getting the website live should be considered as just the starting point, and that as time and visitors progress, so the website should be modified and improved. It is likely that your competitors are improving and modifying their websites, you should be doing the same.
Important Note: When working on the website make sure that you don’t follow old SEO approaches which were manipulative and wonky. The old style practices of spamming content and gaining inappropriate links no longer work for SEO and in fact will be penalised by Google. For websites now SEO it’s all about content, authority, and reputation.
5: Keep on top of your websites health and performance
The most popular website platform is WordPress (in fact ~455,000,000 sites are built on WordPress). WordPress websites need to be updated and maintained to ensure that themes, PHP and plugins are updated to maximise performance and minimise security risks
SEO software to use on your website.
Google Analytics
No matter what reporting tools and dashboards you use, it’s a good idea to set up Google Analytics. Install this as early as possible on your site so you have plenty of historical data. Use real-time traffic tests to double-check for errors. It may be useful to configure multiple profiles to enable your team to run faster analysis of various views of the data. e.g. profiles to monitor traffic by source, technology, geography or referral.
Google Search Console
Search Console is like the marmalade to Google Analytics’ butter. It tracks the keywords that bring people to your site and checks for errors like 404s or duplicate/missing metadata. Whereas Google Analytics measures what users do on your site, such as bounce rate, Google Search Console measures what happens before they enter, like impressions and clicks. Connect the tool to Google Analytics and submit your sitemap within Search Console. If you want another perspective, you can also check out Bing Webmaster Tools.
Google Tag Manager
Google Tag Manager is a quick and easy way to manage all Google and third-party tags in one place. And Google Tag Manager enables you to work more efficiently and seamlessly with your IT team. Use it for campaign and event tracking, testing, QA, troubleshooting and integration between your paid and organic campaigns
For a free website performance and health check click here To contact Andrew Goode FCIM MBA MSc to discuss in more detail contact me
Looking to improve your website then make sure you identify Your Business Development Sweetspot
Finding your business development sweet spot
4 key Business Development Elements
- Passion – this business activity really excites you
- Profession -you have the skills and capabilities to professionally deliver what’s required
- Vocation – doing this seems more than just working
- Mission – this business activity is part of long term objective
Over Arching Business Development Drivers
- You love it – why develop a business on something that you don’t enjoy
- You are great at it – the skills that you already possess can be put to good use
- The world needs it – there is a positive demand / need for the product / service that you have developed
- You are paid for it – The solution you have created has value and you can make profit by providing it
Identify Your Business Development Sweetspot
For more information on business development click here To contact a marketing and sales professional click here
Price Change Calculator
Website Audit Report
Free Website Performance Check
Is Your Website Mobile Friendly
FREE Website Performance Check
- Speed plays an important part in website performance how well does yours perform on desktop and mobile?
- Is your site mobile responsive if not how many customers are you losing?
- Is your site HTTPS?
- With GDPR in place is your site legally compliant?
- Find out about loads more website performance issues
