Those who are just starting out with their own business might be wondering just how much of an online presence they actually need. Do they really need to address all the social media sites? What type of website should they have? How important is creating a brand?
Getting online
The truth is that an online presence is extremely important. Where do the vast majority of people go now when they want to find something out? They head for the nearest search engine. The same applies to products and services. If they want to find out which company can supply them with the right type of flooring for their home, for example, then they do a quick search on Google and let it do all the hard work for them. This means that a business owner can no longer depend upon local advertising in newspapers and word of mouth to build their business. They need to be able to compete with others that offer similar services, and this means going online and creating user-friendly websites and social networking pages in order to be the one that catches the customer's eye first.
Once they have found what they are looking for then it is important to get them to come back again and again. This means that the business owner should keep in touch with them. Get them to sign up to email newsletters; this is a great way of sending them the latest news and offers.
What is needed for an online presence?
Step one is of course a website. The good news is that there are even free options these days, so for those who are just starting out and have a marketing budget that can only be seen with a microscope, it does not even have to cost any money. Careful consideration should be given to the content though as good SEO has the potential to bring in plenty of traffic. Once the customer has arrived, they need to be sold that this is the best place to get the product or service that they are looking for. Then add in pages on Facebook and an account on Twitter and there is the potential to reach millions of people without even leaving the office.
For those who do have more of a marketing budget, it is a good idea to consider the help of professional web designers. It is not that expensive to put together a professional site, and outsourcing this work can also save a great deal of time and money.
A number of successful business people have created a strong online presence. Francesco Corallo is just one of these. He has created a website that gives an insight into various aspects of Italian culture, and the site links directly to information about him and to his blog. To see blogposts from Francesco, all the reader needs to do is click on the link on his homepage.
A little research into the web presence of competitor businesses will show just who is handling their online presence well and who is not. Follow the lead of those that are and then the new business will have a quality website/social media presence as well as a quality product and service.