Digital Marketing for Small Business
We are writing over at Inside Small Business this week. It’s all about small businesses and how to pick the right digital marketing agency. We know it can be confusing to decide so we hope this helps. Click below to read the post.
Brenda Gaddi is a serial entrepreneur. “Give it a go” is her motto for life. She started 3C Digital to give small business owners like herself the chance to harness the power of social media in growing their business. So far, so good…
Try not to yawn or drift off to a daydream just for a second as we talk about SEO for your small business. Yes, we know, it’s not the sexiest of topics — nor is it the easiest to understand. But if you want search engines like Google to find your small business, you need to have a strategy for SEO. In this post, we will break things down for you as much as possible. We’ve compiled an easy-to-understand checklist for you to read and follow. Don’t worry if you haven’t done all of them. It’s good to have a starting point for these things.
Keywords are important for your small business. Yes, you’ve been told to find out what they are but it’s always too hard. Basically, you just need to answer this question: What will potential customers type into Google to find your small business? These words or phrases are the keywords you can use for your small business. Of course, you won’t know these words if you don’t know your own business or your target audience so you need to sort that one out first. It’s best if you know your short tail keywords and your long tail keywords, too. To give you an example, our keywords would be ‘digital marketing small business’ or ‘small business content creation’ or ‘small business SEO’. List down what your keywords are before hiring someone to optimise your site. It’ll make the whole process easier.
Don’t underestimate the importance of adding your small business to local directories in your area. Each local directory you list your small business in helps to push your ranking online. You don’t have to be on all of them, because there are hundreds out there. Just pick around five to start with. We recommend you start with the free local business directories in your area. Then add to sites like My Google Business, Yelp, Pure Local, Yellow Pages, Star Local, and True Local to start with. Make sure you have things like pictures of your small business shop front as well as your products/services. Add your address, phone number, website and office hours. It’s a lot of work but it is worth doing.
Now for some bad news. SEO is not a set and forget kind of thing. When you hire someone to ‘do your SEO’ it doesn’t mean the job is finished when they’ve added all the keywords you want to add. Google loves fresh content and because of this, you’ll need to keep updating your site with relevant information about your industry. How do you do this? A blog is a good place to start. Don’t be overwhelmed, you don’t have to post every day. As we mentioned on our post about why your small business needs a blog, it’ll give you street cred aside from improving your SEO. If you don’t know what to post, find professional content creators like 3C Digital who can help with keywords, choosing topics and writing them for you. Delegate this task if it’s not your strong suit. That way you can focus on what you do best – running your small business.
Brenda Gaddi is a serial entrepreneur. “Give it a go” is her motto for life. She started 3C Digital to give small business owners like herself the chance to harness the power of social media in growing their business. So far, so good…
A common question we get about using Facebook for small business is how to gain a following. It’s a legitimate question, too because if you’re going to be posting there you’d like people to read it. The problem here is that there are so many services out there claiming to be able to give you thousands of followers that quickly. It is a tempting offer and if you didn’t know any better, you’d probably say yes, too. But that kind of following is nothing but vanity metrics. They are not your people. In this post, we will show you three ways to find those true followers for your Facebook page.
Why shouldn’t you? The people you know would know how hard you’ve worked to plan and set up your small business. After all the posts on your personal page about the hardships of setting up a business, it’s good to update them that yes, your small business is finally off the ground. They want to support your endeavour in any way they can so why not start by Liking your Facebook page? After you’ve set up your small business Facebook page, click on your friends on Facebook and start inviting them to Like it. Ask them to share it with their friends, too if they want to show you even more love. It is okay to ask them and they will understand if you do. When you get those couple of followers on Facebook, post a ‘Thank you’ note in there to thank them for their support.
What kind of content exactly? Clients get really stressed about what kind of posts they should be putting up on Facebook. It can be overwhelming if you have no idea what to do exactly. There are things you can do to figure this out yourself. For one, check your competitor’s Facebook page and check out what they’re doing. You don’t need to copy them. Just get some ideas on what kind of things are being posted. Here at 3C Digital, we’ve created a content calendar that our clients can use to schedule their posts on Facebook. If you want a free copy of it, sign up to your newsletter to get updates in your inbox. The calendar has tips on the types of content that will be useful to their audience and how to present them (i.e., videos, graphics, gifs etc). By posting tips, useful information and user-generated content, you will get your target audience’s attention and get them to Like your page.
This one requires you to put aside a budget for your Facebook awareness campaign. Basically, you want to reach your target audience — the ones who don’t know you exist yet. In order to run a successful awareness campaign, you need to figure out first what message you want to put out there. Find your tone (are you bubbly? Serious? Chatty?) and craft a message around that tone. Then you need to really figure out who your target audience is, down to the last detail. Figure out things like where they live, their age, their profession, their home life, their hobbies and so on. By knowing your audience down to the granular level, you can ensure that your campaign will reach the type of people who will want to follow your Facebook page.
Kristyn is the Creative Director of 3C Digital. She is a freelance writer/journalist with over 13 years of experience in the industry both locally and internationally. She has previous experience as TV and radio broadcast journalist as well as print and online writer. Her novels, The Girl Between Two Worlds and The Girl Between Light and Dark, are out now.
How do I use Facebook for my small business?
Last month, we asked our community what their biggest pain points are when using Facebook for their small business. We received an overwhelming response from you guys and we thank you for taking the time to send those answers through. Like we said in the email, we aim to answer all your questions on our site so we can help you with your social media efforts. In this post, we answer the top three most common questions we got.
There are several ways you can direct your Facebook visitors to your website. Here we’ve listed the most common ways you can do this:
This is one of the most common questions we get when we talk to our clients. Sometimes, small business owners forget that they are subject matter experts. There are so many things you can talk about. So many things. Let’s list some of the topics you can use on your Facebook page:
We are currently in the process of preparing our eBook on what to post + content calendar for Facebook. Stay tuned because we will be sending it out to our subscribers in the coming weeks.
This question has different levels of answers. It depends what you’re trying to do on Facebook. Is it just for posting? To engage with your people? Is it to run an advertising campaign? When you decide what you are going to do, then you will know how many hours you need to be on the platform. Creating a content calendar for a month or two and scheduling your post means that you don’t spend as much time on Facebook as other businesses do.
Having said that, you also can’t just post and forget because if your customers engage with your post then you have to respond. Responding to comments increases your community engagement, which is what small businesses want to happen. On the other hand, if you want to start an advertising campaign on Facebook then expect to spend a relatively longer time on the platform than when just adding posts.
Brenda Gaddi is a serial entrepreneur. “Give it a go” is her motto for life. She started 3C Digital to give small business owners like herself the chance to harness the power of social media in growing their business. So far, so good…
Instagram is the fastest growing social media platform today. With over 800 million monthly active users, it is one of the places to be for small businesses. But before you jump on the bandwagon, you need to know whether or not having an Instagram account will help your business. If you want to know which social media platform is the right one for your small business, check out our blog post.
Go ahead, we’ll wait.
Now if you’re sure Instagram is the way to go then good on you. In this post, we will tell you three tips when using Instagram for your small business.
With Instagram, you are not limited to just posting photos. You can also post things like artworks, quotes, inspirational sayings and videos. The best way to ensure that you are maximising your post on Instagram is by having consistent branding that is similar to what you have on your website and other social media channels. Use the same colours, the same fonts, the same style – and add your small business name or logo in there, even your site’s URL. If you don’t want others to copy your work, a watermark of your logo on the photo is worth doing. By doing this, your audience will immediately know your brand when they see it.
The Stories feature on Instagram is the one that goes on top of the app and lasts only 24 hours. After that, the photos/videos go to your archive, which only you can see. If you want to keep your Stories on your Instagram account, you will need to highlight it and add it to a category you’ve created (see the picture). The categories need to be related to your small business. By using the Canva app on your phone, you can also make your Stories pretty. Again, make sure it’s consistent with your branding and contains things like your URL or logo.
Instagram allows up to 30 hashtags per post so make sure you know what is related to your business. To do this, look at other businesses similar to yours and check out what hashtags they are using. Also, by searching for the hashtag itself, you’ll know how many posts are out there with the same hashtag. You don’t have to keep typing 30 hashtags each post too. Planning is key. Make sure you create one already and save it on your phone. That way, all you’ll need to do is copy and paste it. One more thing, double check which hashtags have been banned by Instagram. Having a banned hashtag can affect how many people you reach so it’s worth doing your research beforehand.
Kristyn is the Creative Director of 3C Digital. She is a freelance writer/journalist with over 13 years of experience in the industry both locally and internationally. She has previous experience as TV and radio broadcast journalist as well as print and online writer. Her novels, The Girl Between Two Worlds and The Girl Between Light and Dark, are out now.
Are you thinking of doing more Facebook advertising for your small business this year? Welcome to the world of social media, where all brands, big or small, can use the same avenue with no discrimination. But before you start your advertising plan, it’s good to know more about the whole process. In this post, we will give you three tips before trying out Facebook advertising.
The beauty of Facebook advertising is that you can specify your target down to the last detail. Before you start, list all of your target market’s information. Things like age, sex, profession, income, area, hobbies and so on. Don’t limit it to one category as well. Categorising your target market will make it easier for you to create your ads. The more specific you can make it, the better you’re going to get the results you want.
The story you tell should not only be authentic but also tailored to your specific target market. As a small business, you don’t have the budget to create heaps of different ads to figure out which one works. Try settling for two to three messages targeted to a specific audience. You can push the ads at the same time so you can measure which one works best. Your budget doesn’t have to be too expensive. Around $20 per message is enough for your testing phase.
Do you know how to check the analytics of your Facebook advertising? If you go to the back end of your Business Manager, you will see how your ad is going from the moment you release it. Check out which message is getting a lot more engagement and double down on that one. The ones that are not getting the results you like might need to be taken down or reassessed. Track often so you change things quickly. That’s one of the benefits of Facebook advertising, the results are instantaneous so there’s no waiting around.
Kristyn is the Creative Director of 3C Digital. She is a freelance writer/journalist with over 13 years of experience in the industry both locally and internationally. She has previous experience as TV and radio broadcast journalist as well as print and online writer. Her novels, The Girl Between Two Worlds and The Girl Between Light and Dark, are out now.
