According to research done by Smart Insights, about half of the companies who employ online marketing tactics don’t actually have a strategy. While this is startling at first read, it’s really not that surprising when you think about it. Online marketing relies heavily on time – the time it takes to think of great content, the time it takes to generate that content, and the time it takes to implement imperative marketing tasks – like scheduling frequent updates on social media platforms and posting blogs regularly.
Really, who has the time to do these things, let alone create a strategy that is easy to execute? Well, that’s why dedicated digital marketing firms are a great idea - and you can bank on the fact that they’ll accomplish your most pressing online marketing goals in half the time it would take for untrained novices to.
Below, we’ll talk about three S’s that can’t be overlooked when it comes to improving your presence online
- Show Up
- Stand Out
- Say Hello
1. Show Up
You know that phrase, “Build it and They Will Come?” Yeah, that doesn’t really work in the digital world. Let’s say you invest in a beautiful website redesign – the branding is spot on and the site provides an excellent user experience. This is a great first step in becoming a contender in the digital marketing arena, but you can’t just stop at showing up because even if you have the prettiest, edgiest, most slick site in your industry, you will be invisible unless you make a splash.
2. Stand Out
Sure, part of standing out from the rest is having a great website, but the second part is optimizing your site so that people can actually find you. This is where search engine optimization (SEO) comes into play. While SEO is often flagged as this intimidating, nebulous beast that only industry experts really grasp, it can be summed up pretty simply: SEO = the result of calculated steps in order to be found easily and efficiently on search engines, like Google.
What are these ‘calculated steps’ you speak of, you ask?
a) Use Google Trends to compile a list of keywords that will best serve your company based on the trending and rising terms in your targeted geographical areas and demographics.
b) Create an SEO chart and infuse the keywords into the title tags and descriptions in the back end of your website.
c) Actively and intentionally employ the same keywords in your online content – from your blogs and email newsletters, to your social media updates, as well as the content on the front end of your website.
3. Say Hello
While this sounds like it would be the easiest part of the 3 S’s, don’t be deceived. By “Say Hello,” we mean that you need to network. Take some time to get to know who the leaders in your industry are (Hint: they’re the ones that are winning at the online marketing game). Seek out blogs that have a huge readership and contact the owner. Introduce yourself and ask about becoming a guest blogger, or better yet, an ongoing contributor to his or her blog.
Not only should you reach out and say hi to your peers, but you should also extend a friendly hand to your current and future customers. The best way to do this is through social media. For the first time in the history of marketing, we have a means of actually conversing with our customers and this gives us marketing-types a huge advantage over our ancestors who used to scream into the echoing void in hopes that someone might hear them and take action. Now, we can speak directly to our customers and if we do so in a compelling manner, we will hear back (sometimes instantaneously) – it’s pretty incredible. We could write millions of blogs on how to be successful on social media, but a great rule of thumb is to remember that it is called social media for a reason – it’s social first, and sales-y second. Use your platforms to have a little fun with your fans, engage with them and build rapport – in other words earn their time and trust before your try to sell to them.
So this concludes our blog on the 3 S’s of online marketing, and because we like alliteration, we’ll leave you with this video that inspired the best “S”-word of this whole post: Strategery, enjoy!
Also, the online marketing team at Xynergy® would be more than happy to talk to you about coming up with a killer online marketing strategy for your company or brand. Leave us a quick note today through our easy online submission form
