Outspoken Intel – 5 ways to pull clients to your business with digital marketing.
Inbound Marketing. Digital Marketing. Big buzzwords right now! And you know why? Because they WORK.
In essence, digital marketing is the use of digital technology to achieve business and marketing goals. And the use of this technology PULLS your target audience to your business and website, hence the term ‘inbound’ marketing. The whole idea is that rather than pushing your message out to all and sundry (and close your eyes, cross your fingers and hope that it reaches your target audience) you can actually create valuable content that draws your audience to you.
So, how do you do it? While it does take a bit of planning, below are some ways you can draw your clients to your business. And remember, inbound marketing is a long game. It’s like losing weight – slow and steady gives great gains, quick fixes give a short-term result, but you end up back where you started.
Blog, baby!
The whole idea of blogging (and creating content in general) is to build brand reputation, awareness and affinity. Start writing down different areas of your business, then drill down deeper to words associated with that area of your business. For example, if you’re a personal trainer, you could write down strength training, then dive deeper with weights, resistance, form, anaerobic, supersets, etc. Then you’d write a blog about each of those words, rather than strength training. It’s about making your content last longer!
Create different forms of content.
So yep, you can blog, but you can also create things like ebooks, videos, infographics, a white paper and more! With so many options, you can mix, reuse and repurpose content into various formats. Going back to my personal trainer example, you may have written 10 blog posts on all those keywords associated with strength training. Then you could put together an Ebook about Strength Training, and all you need to do is repurpose the 10 blog posts into the Ebook format. Easy, peasy!
Use social media.
A great way to get the content that you’ve created out to an audience is through your social media channels. Use social media to draw people BACK to the blog on your website, or the ebook available for download on your website. Ultimately, we want to get your audience BACK to your website, where, hopefully, they find your business SO FREAKING INTERESTING that they spend loads of time on there, with a view to engaging your services or purchasing your products.
Google Ads / PPC.
Pay per click (PPC) is another great way to get customers to your website. When you’re searching on Google, you’re in the market to buy, so your business needs to take advantage of that! If someone types in ‘personal trainer in Coffs Harbour’ you’d want to be coming up organically on the first page of Google, while also getting your paid advertisement coming up too. Don’t miss out on an opportunity to capture someone who is in the market to buy, by not having Google Ads.
Paid Social Campaigns.
In another blog, I’ll explain in more detail the difference behind Google Ads and Social Media campaigns, but in the meantime, paid social campaigns are a great way to create awareness of your business. We all know that Facebook and Insta algorithms change all the time, and your organic posts may not get shown to a large portion of your followers. By creating a campaign, and allocating a budget, you can select your audience and know that your message is getting out to the right people. They may not be in the market to buy right now, but they may be in the future.
So, there you have it! See how you go implementing the above and see what comes in!
Want to get more hands-on guidance? Check out Nicola’s Weekly Column on Coastbeat, Outspoken Intel, or book a free online consultation with her!
About the author:
Nicola is co-owner at Outspoken Entourage. Bringing disruptive design to the Coffs Coast, Outspoken Entourage offers a range of services including graphic design, logo and branding, website design, digital marketing packages and social media workshops for business. Marketing and business strategy services are also available through their affiliate, One Fine Day Consulting. Find out more at outspokenentourage.com.au