I often get asked ‘How do I utilise social media as part of my marketing?’. ‘What should the objectives be for my Social Media activity? Brand building? Driving sign ups?’ So many brands feel they need to be on social media, but they really haven’t thought about how to maximise it.

Recently a Client came to me with their list of top keywords. They were confident that these keywords were what their customers searched for. In doing some simple keyword research (using the free adwords keywords planner) I was able to quickly establish that the keywords they thought were relevant were in fact not getting much traffic (in fact non) and there were other terms they had not thought about that, were in fact, much more commonly searched with little or no competition. Ok, I know that this is just too good to be true! But the point I am trying to make is don’t rely on your business knowledge to make key decisions like this. Always back it up with data!

So as a business starting out your digital journey or you might be about to launch a new website what are the things you should always be mindful of at the early stages of development?

1.       Do your research!

Use all the free tools online to understand your target keywords (5-10 to start off with). As I mentioned before you utilise tools such as Google AdWords Keyword Planner. I also really like the SEMRush Keyword research tool, you can get a 30 day free trial and there are other useful tools included.

Analyse your own analytics. Most CMS have their own basic tools and I often find some little nuggets of data that can help guide you amongst it.

2.       What content will you need?

Now you have your data and you know what content is key, start to build your website around this content. Think about how you can use the pages in your site to drive qualified traffic.

What will your tone of voice be across all your channels? Ensure you have the same message being spread. This is especially important if you have several agencies/individuals managing the content. This should be part of your brand guidelines too.

3.       Who are your key influencers?

Think about who influences your target demographic. What content can you create that they might find beneficial.

4.       What digital channels are relevant to your business?

Research the channels you want to be on. For example, don’t go on every social media channel just to have presence there if you cannot support it with content. Doing little or the wrong thing on social media can be more damaging to a brand’s reputation than not having a presence.

5.       Scalability of your website?

If necessary, think about longer term use for your website. So many businesses don’t factor in scalability into their websites and end up having to rebuild a new one as their business grows.

6.       What is the main reason for driving traffic to your website?

Think about the key conversion areas of your website. Data capture? Purchasing products/services? Always maximise every page on your website to ensure you are optimising these conversion points. Even if your website is not transactional, you still want them to action something like contacting you or searching for a supplier. Don’t miss out on any opportunity to convert your traffic.

7.       Don’t forget to maximise your homepage.

So many businesses forget that the homepage is probably the page that will get the most traffic. You still want it to drive conversions so don’t give up this prime real estate for aesthetics. Remember you have 30 seconds to convince them to stay.

I hope you found this useful. It can be a daunting task when starting out. But like any project, building a solid foundation is key to long term success. 

Published by Emma Porter 
https://www.nourishdigital.co.uk/blog/2018/5/25/7-things-to-think-about-when-going-digital