With “Search” becoming the fastest growing form of marketing in the UK, all businesses regardless of size or industry will ignore their online presence at their peril. It’s becoming increasingly important that you understand how potential customers might be using the web and web based technologies to find out who you are and what you can offer them.
Here are three suggestions on how developing your online strategy:
Optimise your site so that potential customers can find you...
An estimated 70% of web users search for products and services, which can be provided to them from a local supplier. Your first action should be to optimise your site so that users searching for your products and services in your town or surrounding areas can find you.
If you operate regionally or even nationally or provide niche services then obviously your potential client base is much wider and you need to promote your USP’s more. Discounted online purchases and free or next day deliveries are very popular with searchers looking to beat high street prices.
Above all else local search marketing can be one of the cheapest forms of advertising whilst providing a much better and clearer return on investment.
Make sure they can find you somehow...
If potential customers can’t find you make sure you’re listed and have links to your site in the directories that appear in the results of your search term. Try typing in the search term for your product or service and your local area. There will be numerous directories, many of which are free to add entries to enable you to build on your online presence.
More often than not a user should not be more than 3 clicks away from your site and this might help drive customers to you whilst at the same time helping out with your position in local search listings.
Many of these offer the opportunity to write reviews and grade businesses, so why not ask some customers to spend a few minutes doing this so your directory entry carries more weight than your competitors.
Build on your online presence...
Only fractionally more than 50% of searches are on website addresses. Very few URL’s have made it into the human consciousness and many users simply search on brand names in the assumption that the site they are looking for will appear top in the search engine results.
Regardless of whether your site appears first or not, you need to build your online presence away from your website. “Pay Per Click” ad’s, online directory entries, online press releases, local community and press websites all offer the opportunity for you to build your online presence so hopefully customers who know you and search for your brand will find numerous other web pages detailing your services and contact details.
Much of these can either be free or incredibly cheap forms of marketing. If you can build links back to your own site from these pages, this will help with your position in local search listings.
Not sure where to start? Well first of all I would recommend using the “Google Keyword Tool” to see the phrases are being used for the products and services in your local area.