Small, local businesses are the lifeblood of the American economy. Some of those businesses don’t yet understand the importance of a marketing campaign. In small towns, word of mouth can often be enough to get by. But if you’re a business owner who wants to expand your reach past the town you’re based in, then you need to consider a local online marketing campaign. Not sure where to start? Here are some tips to maximize marketing and give your campaign the jump start it needs.
Get a Website
If your business doesn’t already have a website, it’s in your best interest to get one, stat. Nearly 70% of American adults don’t use the phone book to look up contact information anymore. Instead, most of them (60%) use the internet to find the information they need. If your business hasn’t carved out a little slice of the world wide web, you need to hire web design services and get that website set up.
Create a Plan to Maximize Marketing
Whether you’ve just started a website or you’ve had one for a while now, it’s important to have a game plan to maximize marketing potential. Many business owners think that simply having a website is enough. In reality, if you’re not doing anything with your website, then your business is going nowhere. Over 85% of consumers say that a website’s content has a major impact on where they choose to make purchases. So, you’d better customize your website with great content.
Get Active on Social Media
Marketing online isn’t just about molding your website to project the image you want. However much content can help, if you’re not accessible or relatable to the community at large, you won’t be getting anywhere. Local online marketing involves being active on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and even Instagram. Not only can this make you more personable to a large population, it can boost your mobile outreach. Since more and more people are using smartphones to access the internet, having a presence on a mobile-friendly app is a big plus.
These three steps are only the beginning of your successful marketing campaign. Reaching out to local SEO experts can boost your campaign, as well as give you the building blocks to a successful online presence in the future.