Small Business Digital Marketing
Here at Local Blitz we work with businesses of all shapes and sizes, though it could be said that small business digital marketing is our sweet spot. We work with small businesses in many different niches and geographies to get them results in the digital world. This article is meant to outline a few different areas of small business digital marketing and how we put them to good use for our clients. Hope it helps bring some clarity to your digital marketing efforts!
Why Small Business Digital Marketing?
We have reached a very unique spot in marketing history, where it doesn’t always have to be the company with the biggest marketing budget that gets the lion's share of the business. There are so many different tactics that can be used to get small business results with digital marketing that know how and creativity can take small businesses a long way, even with minimal marketing budgets. When compared to traditional marketing and advertising outlets like television and radio, the barrier of entry is arguably much lower to starting a digital marketing campaign. Digital Marketing done right is something that should have a fully traceable ROI and also be scalable from a small budget to a larger budget as you see successes. That’s what makes the digital world so unique!
SEO for Small Businesses
SEO or search engine optimization can be a great place for an SMB to start their digital marketing efforts. While SEO is often confused with the whole of digital marketing it is truly just a small piece of the entire puzzle. In the most basic of terms, SEO is meant to gain your small business rankings on Google that will, in turn, create new business leads and/or sales for your business.
Is SEO right for your small business?
While SEO is great, it’s not the right fit for every business. Ask yourself the following questions to figure out if SEO is the right digital marketing strategy for your SMB.
- Do I offer a service that people search for?
- Do I know how many people search for my service?
- How competitive is my business? (The more competitive the harder to get results with SEO)
If you address these questions fully and honestly you should come up with a good gauge of whether or not SEO is the right digital marketing product for your business. If you have a business that people search for that is not overly competitive you may get some quick results with a lower marketing budget in the SEO world. If you have a search based business that is highly competitive, SEO could still be a good fit, but your budget may need to be a bit larger. A great example is Personal Injury attorneys, which is about as competitive as it gets with SEO.
Google Adwords for Small Businesses
Next up is Google Adwords. A robust platform with search and display ads, this is arguably one of the quickest routes to new business leads for your business or organization. If leads are not the major focus, this is still a great way to get exposure. Some considerations about Google Adwords for SMBs If you ask yourself the same questions as you did for SEO, you should be able to surmise whether or not Google Adwords is a good digital marketing strategy for small business. The cost of advertising on Google varies wildly depending on the industry. When you are running Google Ads for small business they charge by CPC or cost per click. So anyone that clicks on your ad is charged to your advertising budget. This being said, some CPC amounts are as low as $.25 per click while others are as high as $950.00 per click. No that is not a typo! It is important that you know what you are getting into before launching an ad for a small business on Google. Anyone who is going to manage these Google ads for you should have tools to give you an estimate on what you should be spending or what you should expect concerning CPC when running ads on Google for your SMB.
Other Digital Marketing for Small Businesses
For the sake of simplicity, I focused this article on digital marketing on Google for small businesses, while of course there are TONS of other options. I will outline a few others that we do everyday for small businesses. Bear in mind this is not an exhaustive list by any means, just a glance at some other options. Hope it helps!
Social Media Marketing and Advertising
- Snapchat
- Etc
Email Marketing
- Lead Nurture Email Marketing
- Optin Email Marketing
Retargeting Advertising
- Bing
- AdRoll
- Etc etc