For decades, the only way of really getting a business known to the general public involved physical labour, namely going out from door to door and talking to people directly, going to local business fairs, and putting up flyers around the local area. And while all of these methods undoubtedly work even today, the internet has completely changed the world of marketing in a number of ways.
For a new business that wants to find real success, going online has become mandatory, especially as almost the entire world is now plugged in, and this means that having a good online marketing strategy is vitally important. These are some of the successful methods of marketing right now.
Search Engine Optimisation
SEO is a buzzword that gets thrown around a lot, but not a lot of people know exactly what it entails. SEO is the generation of organic traffic using specific keywords that are linked to a micro-niche. When a person is looking for something in particular, they will use a keyword of a set of keywords to find information about that topic. This is where having good SEO practices come in to play, which will almost always be directly tied to an article on a business’ website. This can generate a ton of organic traffic over a given month, but it also means having to find a content writer that knows how to properly integrate SEO into their work.
Social Media
Facebook has become more than just an online space for great aunt Judy to post pictures of her cats – it’s now turned into a fully fledged marketing space that generates more traffic than even having a good SEO-optimised website. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube are all great ways of marketing a service or product to the people, especially considering they’re all free to use. It’s possible to do this solely, but hiring a professional service to manage a social media account is also a good idea, and there are many that will include content generation in their service fee. Social media is also a great way of talking to customers directly and doing accurate market research for product and/or service improvement.
Email Marketing
Perhaps the oldest type of online marketing in the world, email marketing is without a doubt still the most successful, with some experts estimating that up to 80% of all sales come from email marketing. This is because email penetration is extremely high; almost everyone has an email account, regardless of their age, demographic, or location. Emails are free to send, and many services will allow bulk emails – thousands an hour – for a relatively low cost.
Emails need to be specifically tailored for the audience, with the right Call To Action segments, automation, and discount offerings, ranging from product offerings to the best bingo games. All of this together makes email marketing the very first step to take for a fledgling business that’s trying to build up a portfolio of loyal customers – just make sure not to send too many emails at once as they will become flagged as spam.