Strong reputations and trust are built on word of mouth. However, if you want to grow your business rapidly, you need to develop a well-thought-out and executed online presence. With seemingly unlimited reach, meaningful engagement opportunities, and the potential for higher profit margins, a strong online presence is essential to stand out and grow.
Ready to grow online? Here are 5 foundations every business should pay attention to:
Create Quality Content That Attracts Customers
When building an online presence, clean, helpful content is still king. Everything is centred around quality content, and it’s what you’ll use to attract your perfect customers and maintain relationships for years to come.
The problem is that the internet is a bottomless pit of content already. In order to stand out in a sea of blog posts, tweets, and low-quality, AI-generated content, you’re going to have to dig deeper to create meaningful and personable content that connects with your audience.
But where do you start? Easier said than done, but the first step is to revisit your content marketing strategy. Once you’ve honed in on your vision, brand story, target audience, goals and distribution channels, it’s time to start creating.
The what, why, and how start with you, but you don’t need to do it all by yourself. Experienced designers and copywriters can help you create high-quality videos, graphics, blog posts, case studies, FAQs, and much, much more.
Optimize for SEO to Increase Visibility
Spending time on search engine optimization (SEO) is the best way to improve your rankings in search engines like Google and attract more clicks. Without it, your site won’t have a chance of competing and will fall into the abyss of the trillions of indexed pages and pages and pages and pages…
The problem with SEO is that it’s so far-reaching with so many points of optimization, it can be difficult to know where to start or where to focus your energy. That’s why it’s always smart to have a tried-and-tested SEO services professional on your side.
First, there’s on-page SEO, which is focused on improving the visible content on your website. That means keywords, headings, links, and images to start, but it is the entire experience that makes a website more friendly for users and relevant for search engines.
Then there’s off-page SEO – the stuff going on outside your website. Here, it’s all about building up the brand and its credibility. That includes local SEO like Google Business Profile, link building, social media engagement, and brand management on other platforms like review sites.
Finally, there’s technical SEO, which is everything going on behind the scenes. This is the stuff the professionals can truly help with, because it’s generally inaccessible for the average business owner. Optimizing for technical SEO, with important items like schema markup, ensures your website performs well, functions as it should, and is crawlable and indexable by search engines.
>>Learn more about SEO strategies and services that will boost your visibility and earn you more traffic.
Polish Your Website for Conversions
When growing a business online, your website is your foundation. Digital advertising, social media and email are important, but funnelling users to your website will almost always be the end goal. Upon landing on your website, the experience a user has could make or break a sale or relationship.
Clunky, outdated design, navigation headaches and broken functionalities are actively working against your business.
One of the most commonly found gaps our web developers come across is with the mobile experience. The majority of searches come from mobile devices, yet many websites neglect the mobile experience. Elements don’t fit correctly on the page, images are too large, page loading times are slow, and design layouts are cluttered. Mobile optimization is something every business needs to stay on top of.
If you don’t already, you may also want to consider selling your products and services online. Using a platform like Shopify, you can easily showcase your products, manage inventory, make sales, track your orders, and improve your marketing efforts with incredible tools and integrations.
Invest in Paid Advertising
Working alongside your organic SEO efforts, paid ads are another piece of a complete marketing strategy with the ability to deliver instant traffic to your site. Plus, of all the marketing strategies out there, some of the greatest returns on investment online can be achieved with paid digital ads.
There are several places to spend your money on paid ads, but it’s hard to beat Google. Google Search ads are typically the best way to reach users with intent, allowing businesses to show meaningful content to users at the right time and right place. Here, you can pay your way to the top spot in Google Search and reap the rewards.
Outside of Google Search, there are numerous places to display paid ads to reach users while they’re shopping, browsing, and connecting with friends. Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Google’s display network (including YouTube) are some of the best places to do so.
>>Learn more about how paid ads can bolster your presence online while delivering quality leads and customers.
Build a Social Media Presence that Engages
In order to grow your business and market to your target audience, you’re going to have to meet them where they are. And more often than not, the best place to find them is on social media. Every generation and demographic has different behaviours on social media, so the first step is determining who your customers are and where to find them. Whether you’re looking for young, Gen Z adults on TikTok or Millennial mother on Facebook.
Maintaining a social media presence allows a business owner to spread their story organically, raise brand awareness, and control the narrative of their brand chatter! If done correctly, there’s a lot of opportunity out there. Social media is the place for developing meaningful relationships with customers while generating real engagement that results in website traffic and sales.
Bringing it All Together
Growing your business online isn’t about quick wins; it’s about getting the fundamentals right. When content, SEO, your website, advertising, and social media work together, you create momentum that drives real, lasting growth.
Whether you’re refining what you have or building from the ground up, focusing on these five foundations will help you stand out, connect with the right audience, and turn attention into action.
Ready to strengthen your online presence? Get in touch with Caorda to get started.