Running your own business is one of the most challenging undertakings most people will face in their lives. Just getting your business idea from the planning stage to your big opening takes a great deal of work. You know better than anyone that it doesn’t end there, though. If you want to achieve long-term success, you’ll also have to grow your business. Online marketing is a huge part of that.
Online marketing can be a bit different from traditional advertising. Sure, there are pay per click (PPC) campaigns you can buy that act as traditional advertisements through banner ads. You can also purchase social media advertisements and campaigns, but you may find that these methods don’t quite bring in the conversions you need. Online marketing can be tricky, so if you want to use it to increase your customer base, you’ll need some useful tips. Here are just a few to get you started.
Bring in enterprise marketers.
It’s possible that your business has already grown as large as you can make it on your own. Particularly if you’ve already expanded into multiple storefronts, you may need an enterprise marketing strategy. While a traditional marketing strategy would be geared around maintaining your existing customers and gradually bringing in new customers, enterprise-level marketing seeks the exponential growth that’s needed to maintain an enterprise business. Multi-channel marketing and brand awareness campaigns are two of the most popular approaches for a large-scale marketing team.
Enterprise marketing companies hire a diverse range of expert marketers who can help you branch into any channel or skill set, regardless of your level of experience. Modern business is a world ruled by big data, but you don’t have to be a data scientist to reach your target audience.
The best enterprise marketers have experts in data fields, as well as machine learning and artificial intelligence, who can help you bring on new technologies to take your marketing program to the next level. Advanced analytics will help you make better business decisions, identify the best target markets for your niche, and help your entire company grow with proven strategies.
Embrace content marketing.
Many marketing experts consider content marketing to be the future of online advertising, and the best thing about it is the fact that you can do it yourself. Content marketing simply refers to any original content you create and distribute that shows off your products, services, and industry expertise. Examples could include informative blog posts on industry websites, YouTube video tutorials, or podcasts that cover new industry trends.
The point of this kind of content strategy is to connect with your audience on a personal level. It’s an opportunity to show them exactly how your business can solve their problems better than anyone else. The more high-quality content you produce during your marketing efforts, the more trustworthy you’ll start to seem to customers in your niche. Digital marketing and social engagement like this adds another layer to the customer experience, and they’ll see your business as one that truly looks out for their best interests.
Don’t forget about your security.
While a great digital marketing strategy is crucial for growth, don’t let it distract from the basics of running your business, such as securing it against physical threats. There are few ways to get worse publicity than when a customer is harmed in your store. You probably already have security cameras in place to deter thefts and assaults, but what if you could identify physical threats to your business before they surface? There is a way to scour public forums, the deep and dark web, and even chan boards for threatening messages. Of course, you might be wondering, what are chan boards?
Chan boards are anonymous forums that allow discussion of, essentially, any topic. The most popular chan boards include 2chan, 4chan, and 8chan, though there are many others. These boards require no accounts, and they’re deleted after a certain period of time, so they leave virtually no trace of their existence. This makes them places where freedom of speech is entirely unbound, even when it comes to making threatening statements.
These boards have been problematic for years as breeding grounds for online harassment and even serious crimes. You need an open-source intelligence tool that can monitor even these boards for threats made against your business, so you can act ahead of time to prevent attacks, theft, and other crimes, so you can continue to promote your business locations as safe places that prioritize customers first.
