As a small business, it is more crucial now than ever before to ensure that your marketing strategy evolves with the times so you don’t get left behind. Everything and everyone is going digital, which means if you don’t cater for this new tech savvy audience you are going to fall behind your competitors and lose a lot of potential business.
Many small to medium businesses have avoided going digital due to lack of knowledge or understanding of the steps they need to take to truly integrate their online and offline presence. The Internet isn’t going anywhere and as more consumers opt to buy and research online rather than in physical stores, your options are limited. You simply cannot ignore going digital if you want to compete and build a future for your brand.
Why Your Business Needs Digital Marketing
1. Profitable
Contrary to other marketing methods, digital marketing is usually a fixed price service provided by an agency. Due to this, it is an extremely profitable technique as you will always pay the same monthly charge no matter how much profit you earn. Digital marketing strategies can be set up especially for your business so that your business goals, budget and ad spend is all taken into account. Digital marketing also provides a brilliant ROI compared to more traditional marketing avenues such as radio and print advertising that cannot be accurately tracked.
2. Proven
Businesses all over the globe have recognised digital marketing as something that they need to invest in order to make the most of their website. You could have the most visually appealing website of them all, but if your digital marketing is poor or non-existent then no one will even see it! Digital marketing is proven to work, just check out some case studies of small businesses just like yours.
3. Visibility vs Being Invisible
The truth is, without a digital marketing campaign to boost your visibility online, the likelihood of your website succeeding over your competitors is very slim. Digital marketing is the difference between being found online and being invisible to online consumers. Whilst marketing strategies such as email marketing can deliver moderate amounts of traffic, they do not compare to the consistency and unbeatable ROI of digital marketing.
4. Go Mobile
Mobile phones have taken the world by storm and have changed the scene for business as well as entertainment. You only have to open your eyes to your surroundings to see that mobile phones are becoming more and more popular with consumers. The number of searches from mobile devices has overtaken the number of searches made from desktop computers, proving that being optimised for mobile devices has never been more important as if your website (or lack of website) is poor, consumers will look elsewhere.
5. Competitors
If your competitors have already adapted to the digital era and rank above you in the Google search results, this is surely further proof that doing nothing isn’t going to help you succeed? Ranking at positions 1-3, the positions with the most visibility and clicks, can be difficult – but not impossible.
6. Trust The Numbers
Did you know that a website that ranks in the top 3 positions in Google can get up to 33% of all clicks for that search? The boost in traffic and sales will surely justify the spend for a digital marketing strategy.
Lauren Squire is a digital marketing executive at In Front Digital, a Midlands based digital marketing agency in the U.K. specializing in SEO, PPC and analytics consulting. In Front works with a range of local and international businesses to help them increase their online visibility and achieve a great ROI.
