Are you looking for ways to help your online business gain new customers?

If so, it’s time to invest in digital marketing for online businesses. With a digital marketing strategy in place, you’ll help more people discover your business and go from prospects to customers.

So, how do you get started with small business online marketing?

Here are six online marketing strategies we’ll cover:

1. Optimize your website for search engines
2. Start creating content
3. Run paid search ads
4. Develop a social media presence
5. Nurture leads through email marketing
6. Build your reputation with review management

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1. Optimize your website for search engines

When you do digital marketing for online businesses, it’s fundamental that you optimize your business to appear in search engines. With over 93% of all online experiences starting with a search engine, your site must appear in relevant search results. With search engine optimization (SEO), it can.

SEO is the process of optimizing your website to help it rank in search results. Here are some best practices you’ll want to follow to do SEO successfully:

Find and integrate relevant keywords

To help your site appear in relevant search results, you need to incorporate relevant keywords in your pages. You can find the right keywords by conducting keyword research and using keyword research tools, like KeywordsFX, to find terms.

When you’re looking at a list of terms, stick to ones with three or more words, also known as long-tail keywords. Long-tail keywords drive better results for your business because they’re more specific. When someone searches these particular keywords, you know what they’re hoping to find.

Optimize your title tag and meta description

If you want your site to rank well in search results, you need to optimize your title tag and meta description. Users look at these tags to determine your site’s relevance — search engines use title tags to determine your relevancy.

To optimize your title tag and meta description, stick to their 60 and 155-character limit, respectively. Additionally, you’ll want to ensure you use your core keyword in both tags, so users and search engines know your listing is relevant to search results.

Ensure your site loads quickly

A slow-loading site doesn’t bode well for search rankings. Users don’t want to wait for slow-loading pages so you need to ensure your site loads quickly to deliver a positive user experience.

Use a tool like Google PageSpeed Insights to help you see how quickly your site currently loads. You can then take Google’s suggestions and implement them into your site to help it run better. Additionally, you can invest in page speed services if you feel overwhelmed or don’t have experience editing your site’s backend.

2. Start creating content

When you learn how to market an online business, you’ll often hear people talk about the importance of creating content. Content marketing involves crafting informative pieces of online content and sharing them with your audience. It’s one of the best online marketing strategies for driving qualified traffic to your site.

Not to mention, content creation is fundamental to helping you increase your rankings in search engines. Your content gives you something to rank in search results, while SEO helps your content rank in search.

When you craft content, you create an opportunity to establish yourself as an authority in your field. To get started with this strategy, follow these best practices:

Use various content formats

There are multiple types of content you can create for your audience. From blog posts to videos to infographics, you want to use various content formats to get your audience interested in your business.

Using a variety of content keeps your strategy fresh for your audience. Additionally, it enables you to appeal to multiple people in your audience who consume content differently.

Ensure you match the user search intent

When you craft content, it’s critical that you check the user search intent. User search intent is the meaning behind a search — what is someone hoping to find by conducting a specific inquiry?

When you have a content topic idea, search it in Google to see what content is already ranking. Performing these searches will help you understand your topic or keyword’s search intent and enable you to craft content that meets your audiences’ needs.

Publish content consistently

When you include content marketing as part of your small business online marketing plan, you need to publish content consistently. Publishing content consistently shows your audience that you’re actively staying up to date in your industry. It also creates new ways for you to rank in search.

You can use a content calendar to help ensure you publish content often. A content calendar enables you to schedule when you’ll craft, edit, and publish your content. This tool is excellent for helping you stay focused on crafting content.

3. Run paid search ads

One of the best online marketing strategies for growing your business is pay-per-click (PPC) advertising. PPC ads appear at the top of the search results above organic listings. These ads drive qualified leads, with 65% of all high-intent searches resulting in someone clicking on an ad.

By launching PPC ads, you can put your business at the top of search results and outrank your competition.

If you want to know how to promote a business online using PPC, follow these best practices:

Bid on long-tail keywords

If you want your PPC ads to drive success, you need to bid on long-tail keywords. As we mentioned prior, long-tail keywords are specific, so they drive more qualified leads for your business — the same applies to choosing these keywords for PPC ads.

Long-tail keywords also cost less because they’re specific, and fewer companies bid on them. As a result, you have a lower cost per click (CPC), enabling you to stretch your budget further.

Use ad extensions to enhance your ads

If you want your PPC ads to stand out from your competition, use ad extensions. Ad extensions enable you to add more information to your ads that can increase the likelihood your audience clicks on your ads.

There are numerous ad extensions you can use, from sitelink extensions, shown above, to callout extensions. You can test out these different ad extensions on your campaigns to figure out which ones drive the best results.

Create a separate landing page for each PPC ad

If you use PPC advertising as part of your small business online marketing strategy, you’ll want to add landing page design to your list too. Landing pages play a fundamental role in helping you turn leads into conversions.

For the best results with your PPC campaigns, you’ll want to create separate landing pages for each ad your run. These pages should focus solely on the content you presented in your ad copy. Having a dedicated landing page prevents users from being distracted and keeps them focused on the product or service of interest.

4. Develop a social media presence

If you want to know how to do digital marketing for online businesses, start by developing a social media presence. Social media platforms are an excellent place for you to connect with prospects interested in your business and nurture them towards conversion.

With over 74% of people using social media when making a purchasing decision, you don’t want to miss an opportunity to nudge these prospects towards choosing your business.

To help you build a killer social media strategy, make sure you do the following:

Create a consistent brand image across all platforms

You can build a presence on multiple social media platforms for your business. When you use various platforms, it’s fundamental to create a consistent brand image across each platform.

Building a consistent brand image means that your profile photo, cover photo, and content you post should have a similar look and feel. By doing this, you build a consistent brand image and help people get familiar with your business.

Engage with your audience

As the name implies, social media is about interacting with people and having conversations through these platforms. When people interact with your business through social media, take time to engage with them.

If someone leaves a comment, comment back. If someone airs a problem with your company, take time to respond. This engagement will help you build better relationships with your audience and nudge them towards becoming customers of your business.

Run paid advertisements

Along with building your organic presence, you’ll also want to run paid advertisements. Social media advertising enables you to reach qualified prospects that haven’t discovered your business yet. It’s a great way to earn new leads and sales for your business.

When you craft social media ads, use high-quality visuals and compelling ad content to entice your audience to click. Additionally, creating a separate landing page can help you keep your audience conversion-focused and increase your business’s sales.

5. Nurture leads through email marketing

When you learn how to market an online business, you discover that reaching out and capturing leads are only half of the puzzle. Once you capture them, you must nurture them into sales for your business. This part is where email marketing can help.

With a return on investment (ROI) of $44 for every $1 spent, this strategy is excellent for helping you turn leads into sales.

Email marketing enables you to send marketing directly to your audiences’ inboxes. To help you drive success with this strategy, follow these best practices:

Personalize your emails

If you want to drive success with email marketing, you need to personalize your email strategy. Personalization enables you to deliver a tailored experience for your audience to see the most relevant information to their interests.

You can personalize your email strategy by segmenting subscribers based on their interests and sending them tailored content based on those interests. You can also use small touches, like including the subscriber’s name, to make subscribers feel like your emails are curated just for them.

Create a compelling subject line

Part of the battle with email marketing is getting people to open your emails. If you want to succeed with email marketing, you must create a compelling email subject line that entices subscribers to open.

You can make your subject lines more compelling by using emojis, capitalization of specific words, or using the subscribers’ name. Additionally, creating a sense of urgency in your subject line, like a limited-time offer, can encourage leads to click and open emails.

Use an email marketing tool

When you craft an email marketing strategy, you’ll find that you can quickly get bogged down trying to create personalized emails, send them to subscribers, and monitor their performance. To help make your life easier, use an email marketing tool.

An email marketing tool, like MyEmailFX, makes it easy for you to craft compelling emails, send them to subscribers, and track how subscribers interact with them — all in one place. Email marketing tools like this one help you save time that you can spend on other marketing projects.

6. Build your reputation with review management

Last on our list of online marketing strategies for your business is review management. Reviews play a fundamental role in helping you obtain leads and sales for your business.

In fact, 92% of users trust recommendations over a brand.

If you want to earn more sales for your business, you need to spend time obtaining and managing reviews for your business.

To do review management successfully, follow these tips:

Follow up with customers

The best way to get reviews is to follow up with your customers. After someone buys your product or uses your service, follow up with them and ask them to rate their experience or purchase.

How soon you ask for your review will depend upon what your audience purchases. You want to give your customers enough time to try out the product to leave a quality review. For services, you may follow up that day or the day after, while the experience is fresh in their minds.

Thank people for leaving reviews

When someone takes time to leave a review about your product or service, make sure you thank them for doing it. People don’t have to leave your business a review, so you must acknowledge their effort to help other prospects determine if your business is the best fit.

Responding to people shows them you’re listening to their feedback, too. It will incentivize more people to leave reviews so they feel heard.

Offer solutions for negative reviews

Not everyone will leave a review of a positive experience with your business. Negative reviews will happen, and you must take the time to respond to them and offer a solution.

When you offer a solution, you show your prospects that you’re willing to solve problems and provide a better customer experience. It builds people’s confidence in your company and purchasing your products or services.

Get started with digital marketing for online businesses today

Now that you know how to market an online business, it’s time to get your strategies up and running. If you aren’t sure where to start, WebFX is here to help. We have a team of over 250 marketing experts that can help you craft a custom campaign for your business.

With over 20 years of experience, you can feel confident that we know how to craft digital marketing campaigns that drive results. In the past five years alone, we’ve driven over $2.4 billion in sales and over 6.3 million leads for our clients.

Ready to see what WebFX can do for you? Contact us online or call us today at 888-601-5359 to speak with a strategist about our digital marketing services!