It’s no secret that, in order to expand your business, you need to increase your online presence. If you are not visible online then how can people find you? Promoting your business online may seem daunting with all the resources out there, but it is feasible. Read more about how you can easily promote your business online.

1. Create a Website

A website is the single most important item when you have a business. It allows you to operate 24/7 without the overhead cost. If you’re solely relying on a Facebook or social media page for business referrals, you are missing out on thousands of daily online searches. Web tools such as Squarespace or Wix are user-friendly web designing platforms that help you get a website launched with no coding experience necessary. Read more about how your website and social channels work together to bring you more business

2. Video Marketing

A recent study found that millennials prefer videos over any other type of online advertisement. Over 75% of millennials are also more likely to follow a brand on YouTube. Uploading engaging, entertaining and informative videos can easily be done on a variety of platforms. Video marketing tools such as RenderForest are user friendly and provide many ways to create and edit. Also, don’t count out fee services like Facebook Live and Snapchat, especially when targeting a younger audience. Facebook Live allows you to connect with your audience directly and can help you to create excitement around product releases. (Just be sure to create a content plan that will be engaging to your viewers so that you’re not ‘winging it’ when you go live.)

3. Blogging

Blogging is a great chance to really engage with your audience while introducing new ideas and information. Include links that drive the reader to your website and social media accounts. Blogging also “tells” search engines what your website is about and quality traffic to your blog pages boosts your quality website score which can improve your ranking in search query results. Consumers are smart cookies and they know when they are being force-fed a product. By publishing content that is informative, valuable and relative to what they are searching for, you will earn your audience’s trust. Over time, they will gain more interest in you and view your brand as being trustworthy and valuable of their time. For example, a business that sells toys will want to develop blog topics based on search terms like popular toys, parenting concerns or kids activities, in order to direct search engine traffic from parents looking up helpful ideas.

4. Don’t Forget to Link

Website links, links to social media accounts, links to products and blog links, all work together to drive people to your online business. If you send a weekly newsletter, include a link to your website, products, social media accounts or your blog throughout the content.

5. Create a Social Media Strategy

Did you know millennials are responsible for spending over $200 million annually? Who wouldn’t want a piece of that multi-million dollar pie? Take a huge slice by increasing your social media usage. Use the apps that effectively relay your brand’s message. Study your competitors and their methods of reaching new followers. Schedule your posts and determine how many posts a day are right for each particular platform. When it comes to social media posting, once per day isn’t enough for some platforms. Different social media sites use different algorithms, so if you’re only posting once a day to Twitter, your tweet is likely to go unnoticed. Using a tool such as Hootsuite or Buffer will generate a social media posting schedule for you automatically.

Here’s an idea of what you’ll need to post on your pages. People like a mix of short and long form posts to when browsing social media. You want to mix promotional and branded content with blog posts for optimal SEO benefits. Sharing your blog posts takes care of long form and also provides crucial links which help with your SEO placement on Google. Short form posts are your way to build up relationships with your followers. The back and forth dynamic between page and follower helps your brand build loyalty among consumers, usually through the page responding to, sharing and highlighting posts from followers. Giving your followers attention and giving positive feedback does a lot of work towards developing relationships with followers to keep them coming back and buying your service or product. 

6. Stay on Top of SEO Trends

While SEO is a very helpful tool for any business online, it takes more than just plugging a few words in and calling it a day. SEO keyword trends are constantly evolving and it’s important to stay up-to-date. Google Adwords helps you determine which search terms are being used more frequently than others. You also want to keep track of your key demographics and adjust your SEO as often as your demographics change. As mentioned previously in the toy store example, knowing the peripheral topics your users are searching for is vital, like knowing parents looking for toys are also wondering about safety concerns and party ideas. While parties aren’t exactly a toy store’s area of expertise, Google will rank the toy store’s site higher because of the strength of its links from SEO blog writing. Finding the right topics to write about in relation to your company’s products and services is a major boost to your site’s perceived strength from search engines.

7. Analyze Your Efforts

Study your website’s and social media accounts’ traffic with useful tools like Google Analytics. These provide input items such as the number of new and repeat visits on a site, engagement activity and which platforms bring in the most traffic.  After seeing the results, you may be surprised. Your analytics results will tell you how your customers are browsing on your site. Start studying which social platforms have attracted more likes, views and interests. Put the focus on what could bring more business to your brand.

Don’t miss out on the opportunity to increase your brand’s awareness. By taking small steps and using these tips one by one, you will easily generate more leads and help your business grow.