These days nearly every type of business has developed an online presence, from the biggest global corporation to the smallest one man band. In fact, a recent survey estimated that there are now around 200 million sites worldwide, made up of business to business and business to consumer websites, blogs, forums and social media sites such as Facebook, twitter, Linkedin– the list is endless. Today the choices facing audiences are enormous and the challenges facing businesses are equally vast. Getting the right audiences to find your business online is an essential first step if you want to start to develop a relationship with potential customers that don’t know you. Every potential customer will want to check you out online either to find out more, browse your products, ask a question, make a complaint, read a review or perhaps donate some money, and they’ll do it anytime of day or night throughout the week. So even when your office door is closed, your business will be open to the world.

In the relatively brief lifespan of the internet, colossal attention has been placed on the importance of search engine optimisation (SEO). This ‘black art’ has been the building block behind the phenomenal success of companies such as Google. For many years businesses have recognised the increasing importance of getting potential customers, particularly those that they don’t know, to find their service or product quickly and easily. Today this is a persistent challenge, as the web becomes a phenomenally crowded environment. This challenge is difficult enough for established businesses, let alone new businesses with no track record. 

So where do you start?

Although SEO is really crucial to being found on the web, there are a number of other activities, both online and offline that will enhance your visibility. A consistent message and image that resonates with a customer offline will help to build ‘top of mind awareness of the business name’, which makes it easier to find you quickly online, either by searching by your business name or using your actual web address. This message can be communicated through a host of static and interactive touch points such as brochures, signage, vehicle livery, radio, games, touch screens, advertising, paper based PR etc… And then there is the online environment, where consistency of message is somewhat harder to control. These include a growing variety of controlled interactive tools such as banner ads, online games and video to a number of channels which at best you can only influence but will be unable to control such as 3rd party social media sites, blogs and forums. These channels in particular, are providing potential customers with the most valuable and trusted insights of your business.

So given that most businesses do not have the huge budgets to spend on every conceivable channel, how do you invest in the right tools that will deliver maximum return on your investment? There is one simple answer to this, understand your customer and what they want and deliver a message to them through carefully selected touch points that they will respond to. For example, if you are a construction company the hoarding around the site becomes a giant advert for the business that many people will see, if you are a bakery, your delivery van becomes a moving message that can be positioned anywhere you chose and if you are a firm of accountants a mixture of tools such as events / exhibitions, brochures and business cards will help to build awareness with specific audiences of your business.  Over the next few months we will explore in more detail how each of these channels can be utilised to deliver measurable results.

So once your audience arrives on your website, what next?
If you get the strategy right, then most potential customers will end up on your website. So what do you do with them when they are there? And how do you direct their journey so that they have a reason to get in touch?

The typical trap that a lot of businesses fall into, is once they have a website it’s a case of “that’s it – we’re online now”, and so long as they publish a bit about the company and show off some products they will be ok. This approach was fine a few years ago, but now things are very different. Today online perception is everything and getting it wrong, gives the customer every opportunity to look elsewhere.

Firstly, to best understand how customers might view your own site, ask yourself some very simple questions:

1)    Is it saying anything different? Is your site using the same tone of voice or messages that are similar to your competitors, if this is the case how will the customer chose between you?

2)    Is it distinctive? Is the colour scheme and overall appearance of your site distinctive enough from your competitors? – if your product or service is something that you want a customer to remember, you will need to ensure the perception your site is creating accurately reflects the unique qualities of your business

3)    Is there a synergy between what you are doing offline (brochures, exhibition stands, vans, adverts etc…) with your current website? customers need to make the connection through all kinds of communication tools, this helps to build a layer of trust prior to them contacting you?

4)    What is the user journey like for a customer navigating through your site compared to that of your competitors? Our expectations of the web have become incredibly unrealistic, we all want to find information on a site instantly and with minimum fuss. Does your site have a strong focus around your potential customer and their journey, particularly as your site may be targeted at a number of different customers, some of which might want completely different things. The home page is the starting point for a customer, is it directing them to what they are really looking for? Are your contact details easily accessible? And how quickly does information appear on the page – is it easy to read?

5)    Is your site optimized so that your website can be found by search engines such as Google and Yahoo? If you have too much animated content (images & text) or the web pages are not indexed correctly this can be a barrier for customers trying to find you through a search engine.

Secondly, how is easy is it for you to edit and change content on your website? Can it be done quickly and easily? Are you able to upload pictures at the right size? Can you add new pages or sections to your website without the need for outside specialist help?

If you feel that your site already addresses most of these issues, well done. If it doesn’t, the chances are potential customers will landing on your competitors websites and you need to take some action. This could be in the form of relatively inexpensive changes and tweaks or a complete new rebuild.

Building a new site can be a significant investment for your business, but it is also an excellent opportunity to attract and engage with a host of new customers. In addition it is a chance to make the best use of technology to enhance the customers experience of your business. Any investment you make needs to be carefully managed, starting with the appointment of the right web design and build team that:

• Understand your business, your brand, it’s ethos and objectives and the market.
• Understand your customers and the way they think and what they want from the site.
• Have a longstanding track record of web projects that can demonstrate value for money.
• Combine strong creative thinking with technical web build expertise.
• Can project manage the design & build of your site in line with your expectations and timescales.

If you would like to discuss how we can improve your brands visibility to customers, call Stephen Blanks on 0191 228 4901.