So, you’ve been told 2011 is all about local. As well as mobile. And social. And video. And reviews. And probably a number of other important elements of the online world. So what the heck do you focus on? Well…when it comes to getting your site found on search engines: all of them.
But! Fear not. Don’t freak out. This doesn’t require elaborate marketing campaigns combining all of these mediums. (In fact, avoid that.) And you don’t need to have the next “Old Spice Guy” idea for social media to have an impact. This just means getting your presence into a healthy mix of all of these mediums, which really comes down to providing great service and engaging with your customers. In other words, do good business. And use these online elements in a natural way.
Here’s an example of how you might integrate them into your everyday business process:
- Let’s say you have a special 3-day only deal for your retail website. Assuming you have your Google Places page claimed and optimized, you post the deal there on Monday (the start of the sale–one of your slowest days).
- You also tweet about it and share it on Facebook, thanking your existing customers for being loyal fans
- An hour later, you notice several retweets of your deal and thank those followers for sharing the love
- Another friend of one of the retweeters sees the message, but wants to learn more about you first, so they search for you on their mobile phone. Luckily, you have a well-optimized mobile site, so this person quickly finds you and has easy access to exactly the information they needed (maybe info like what your company does, some testimonials, products, etc.).
- Person grabs the coupon code from the Tweet, makes a purchase on the mobile site, and since your receipt email includes a sincere thank you message and a link to your Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube pages, he/she mosies over to YouTube, curious to see what video content you have.
- Since one of your videos documents a charity outing you and your staff recently did–which Barb from accounting recorded on her flipcam–your new customer is extra impressed by the kind of business you run and in turn shares these thoughts in a status update on Facebook, with a link to your website
- Meanwhile, one of the original retweeters also uses the deal right away and because she enjoys her shopping experience so much (the well-organized site, the fast-loading images, the prominent customer service number…), she immediately posts a positive review on your Google Places page.
- You of course reply (as you do to most reviews, good and bad), thanking her for her comments, that you appreciate feedback of all kinds, and to let you know how she likes her purchase, once it arrives.
- Random person searching online for stuff you sell in the city where you sell it stumbles upon your Google Places page (because it’s so well optimized for “stuff you sell in the city where you sell it”), sees the great deal and the great reviews, and your willingness to as a business to listen and respond to customers, and heads straight over to your website, coupon code copied and ready to paste.
See? Do good business. Provide thorough, customer-focused service, connect with your customers, ask for feedback—then listen and respond to it, develop information for your website that you know they’d appreciate.
Sure, there are plenty of best practices that are critical to ensuring that your website will be found and that each of these other mediums are optimized well. And there are strategies for ensuring that you’re getting the most out of each of these online marketing mediums. This is where your search and online marketing professionals will help. In the meantime, just do good business.
