Awesome And Excellent Online Visibility Ideas.

In 2016, marketing, branding and PR, are all run through the internet. A strong online presence definitely increases your chance of succeeding in complex and crowded global marketplaces. However, because small business owners have mostly never been involved in getting business online, they are either inexperienced or too preoccupied to worry or care about building an online presence. As discussed in my post Quick Business Development Tips, generally, small business owners do not pay much attention to getting a website for their business, or maintaining it. Remember that most clients and customers will assume that you have a website for your business, because, today most businesses do. All big companies have a website, and they did not become big without it. There are still quite a few small businesses that do not have a website and without one this is exactly what they will remain. If you don’t have a website for your business, potential customers are going to assume that you are a small company that does not take their business seriously. Once you establish this reputation, it is going to be hard to make sales.

Following Trends

While all of us choose to follow some trends and ignore the rest, I would like to bring some data to light in this post. I have collected these numbers through web research and am using them just to convey a message. 97% of consumers use the internet to research products and services locally, before making a purchase. When they go online, 90% use major search engines, 48% access the online Yellow Pages, 42% use sites for rates and services comparison, and approximately 24% use vertical sites. Also, the average consumer uses 7.9 different sources before coming to a decision of making a purchase.

Now, the question arises – why do local small businesses continue to ignore the power of the internet?

All of us know that the Internet has indeed become an integral part of consumers’ local commercial activity. It can easily be said that we have reached an inflection point where the balance of power in local shopping is shifting to online shopping. Regardless of whether your primary focus is on a local market or your aim is much broader, the point remains that you need a solid internet presence to be successful in the modern business landscape.

That aside, today I am going to share some excellent tips for small business owners to grow their online presence and benefit from online groups and communities.

Research the Competition

As you might already be aware, before launching a product, service, program, or campaign, you have to start with some competitive analysis. Understanding who is already out there and what they are doing give you an idea about the existing popularity or uniqueness and scope for your idea. This is true for the virtual world as well. Take a two-pronged approach in which you start by evaluating each competitor’s website, followed by their social media presence to understand what they are doing while you are not. Go through each page of their website, the way they advertise, their support system, customer comments, feedback, resolutions, etc.

Once you have seen and understood what they do and how they do it, compare your own website with theirs. That is, if you even have a website. One of the best things about the internet is that the size of your company does not really matter. If you have a good website, that is user-friendly and sells unique products at competitive prices, there is no reason why your website would not rank ahead of a large multinational competitor on Google, and funnel off some of their traffic. This is an important reason why a website is even more important for a small business than a big one, it helps level the playing field. Once you have a website for your company, advertise as many products as you want on it. Just make sure you contact a good company to create and manage the website. You can totally rely on HyperEffects for all your website related requirements. Our experts are professionally qualified to provide end-to-end support in all your website designing and maintenance related requirements. Entrepreneurs and small-business owners are welcome to enrol for our one-hour free business consultation session to learn more about our support services.

While you visit us for free consultation, I am soon going to return with more tips for small business owners to grow their online presence and benefit from online groups and communities. So, keep checking back!