Digital strategy for SMEs (updated): 7 steps to digital domination

I originally wrote this series for an agency’s business blog back in 2012. When it was taken offline, I revived it on this blog. It is still the most popular post (see panel on the right), so I decided to update it. A lot of it still makes sense, hence the on-going interest, but I wanted to reduce the steps and cover the latest developments… This is part one... keep following to read Creative content to capture customers, Search Engine Optimization for SMEs and Social media: your launch pad for interactive engagement.  

 

Pic: Mr Fring

7 lucky steps to digital domination

Pic: Maxey

Research has shown, time and time again, that customers check out B2C/B2B products and services online before making a purchase. Having an online presence increases trust in your product/service, which is vital for small businesses with a tight marketing budget. 

The internet reaches a wider, cross-generational audience than traditional marketing. So here are 7 steps to create an effective digital marketing strategy from scratch and boost your SEO in the process.

Step 1 Research phrasal keywords & optimize your website

Keywords are old hat. People use multiple words to search, for instance 'cheap holidays in Spain', 'best digital cameras' or 'cheap cars in London'…  Google Keyword Planner can help you find the keywords. Do not just go for high matches, medium-strength keywords might work well too if they are a close match to your offer (product or service). There is no obligation to ‘buy’ the keywords if you do not fancy doing PPC (pay per click). If you do, consider a brief campaign to test the waters. PPC can be quite expensive if your market is crowded. Once you have identified your phrasal keywords, use them in your website’s back-end and naturally in your content - keyword stuffing is penalised by Google. Use them in body copy, headings and picture captions. A typical back-end code looks like this:

<meta name="keywords" content="phrasal keywords go here, separated by commas"/>

Step 2: Create a blog and other content
Everybody knows that content is king. Content is not just words but also pictures, videos, podcasts and infographics. Your website should be worded with your customer in mind and allow for the short attention span and time-poor behaviour of surfers. More in-depth information can be conveyed through a blog, e-book, video or podcast.

Step 3: Promote your content with social media

Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and Pinterest are still the main social media platforms. Further platforms can be considered if you target younger audiences, mobile audiences, etc. As a rule of thumb, Twitter and LinkedIn are mostly used for B2B (business to business) interaction, while Facebook and Twitter are perfect for B2C (business to consumer). The difference between Instagram and Pinterest can be sex and age demographics (for instance, Pinterest users are mostly women). Other channels, such as Snapchat, cater for younger audiences. However digital divides often blur, with companies using all platforms and most firms jumping on Pinterest’s and Instagram’s bandwagons – a picture (or infographic) is indeed worth 1000 words. You can argue that a video is worth millions, so if you are a keen communicator, you should leverage YouTube as much as possible. There is plenty of free information online to keep you up to date with social media trends – Mashable, Social Media Examiner and Search Engine Watch offer excellent, free e-newsletters.

Step 4: Convert your website’s traffic into leads

Your website is ranking well, you have plenty of visitors, your blog is well received, but how can you turn your followers into customers? Don’t spread yourself too thinly, keep up with social media platforms and engage with your customers by giving away free advice, samples, consultations - whatever it’s suitable for your business to offer as an incentive to clinch the deal.

Step 5: Nurture your leads with email marketing

Email marketing is the 21st century's answer to junk mail – but not as we know it. Customer engagement is key - your registered users want to hear from you and are keen to receive your e-newsletters via email. Focus on their problems and offer solutions – a pull rather than push strategy involving building a relationship and earning trust. For instance, if you sell gardening products, potential customers could get emails with gardening tips, short tutorials for easy makeovers and seasonal advice to showcase how your products can enhance their outdoor living. Bear in mind that from May 2018 new privacy laws (GDPR) will become effective. You must make sure you have written permissions to email your customers/followers. In doubt, you need to clean your lists by emailing everyone, request their permission to email them information and allow them to opt out. Guidance from the UK government is here. 

Step 6: Be mobile friendly

Portable internet and wifi mean that some of your customers might be surfing the net from a mobile phone or a tablet, so check with your designer that your website displays well on mobile devices. Google Analytics can give you a helping hand by indicating how mobile impacts your business – you can get free reports showing how your visitors are accessing your website.

Step 7: Analyse and refine your marketing strategies Many businesses still think that once their optimised website is up and running and they have one successful social media campaign under their belt, they are there... Yes they are, but not for long. In the fast-changing digital world, new platforms are constantly created and trends come and go at the speed of lightning. Your competitors won’t be standing still either. Small businesses should review their website at regular intervals. Refresh your content, keep up with social media, regularly monitor your visitors with Google Analytics and use all the free tools and information available to improve or maintain your ranking. If you think you can spare some money from your budget, invest in marketing automation (Hootsuite, HubSpot, SEM rush, Buffer, etc).

From the content brew to the SEO soup

One of my most popular PowerPoint presentations on Slideshare is Lucky 7 steps to digital domination, tongue-and-cheek slides that are still relevant in our ever-changing digital landscape. The presentation displays a great infographic about content, which I reproduce below as it has stood the test of time. Tea (and perhaps coffee) drinkers will get a kick out of it.

Now bear me with while I prepare the SEO soup... Bon Appétit

P.S. I am rewriting the Digital Marketing Series for SMEs, popular since 2012!

SEO that makes sense – no witches’/wizards' hats required & white gloves at all times

Pic: Bifetito

I have been too busy practising SEO to write about it. SEO is not dead, it has evolved. I have kept up-to-date through SEW and Social Media Examiner plus Econsultancy for a UK angle. I have also deployed SEO for my personal branding. I am not a cold caller and use my website and social media channels to secure work as a consultant or as a contractor. 

In the past four years or so, I have been working exclusively for SMEs and non-profit organisations so the main challenge has been to scale down the multi-national marketing model and do everything on a shoestring budget. As I read the last SEO articles of 2016, here are a few reflections and insights from my experience so far.

95% Organic

My SEO approach has been mostly organic with a small, outsourced PPC sideline. I work for small organisations and PPC has been deployed only for temporary campaigns as it would be too costly for my clients in the long term. So from my ‘content is king’ castle, I have been using Google Analytics to monitor Serps (search engine research pages). 

As I do not do management speak because it only confuses/irritates my clients, this is the general thinking behind my SEO strategy, which is then personalised to suit the customers' profile and scope of the organisation. I do not do One Size Fits All SEO because firms come in different shapes and sizes.

SEO strategy for SMEs

This is what strategy boils down to: 

• On page SEO: pages should be well written with keywords inserted naturally in titles, flowing paragraphs, picture captions and metadata. There are a lot of articles about nefarious Google updates, but here are your warnings in a nutshell:

Pic: Scrumshus

• Beware of lazy Pandas – there is no excuse to have low-quality content or web copy that is updated once a year or less often. 
• Beware of slippery Penguins - links to inferior websites are now toxic, they do not just devalue a website, they contaminate it. In the worst case scenario, a full audit is required. 

Pic: Andrew Shiva

• Off page SEO: websites should only have quality links (i.e. to respectable sites, blogs, etc - see Penguin above). It's also worth adopting a realistic social media schedule to keep all channels ticking. Do not be tempted to schedule all the tweets, though… 

Digital goals

I will keep it short and sweet:

• Authority – target influencers to review or test your product/service, consider blogger outreach
• Value – upgrade your content by including popular topics (queries from your customers, searches for relevant products, customers’ forums, etc)
• User experience – monitor your website for broken links, ease the navigation by diminishing the number of tabs on the home page 
• Speed (you only need an image resolution of 72dpi for a website, do not use photos straight from the digital camera because they will slow down page upload)
• Present relevant content - clear, concise and to the point, no waffling or going off tangents, please!
• Ranking – invest more time and manpower in quality content: photos, articles, infographics, videos
• Freshness – Monitor your online presence and refresh your website at regular intervals.

Optimise to capitalise

SEO menu extras:

• Offer video transcripts/subtitles – many people prefer to read subtitles or the 
• transcript as they cannot play a noisy video in an open-plan office. Do host your videos on your website, not just YouTube.
• Create content that is shareable – if appropriate use humour and always have something catchy at hand.
• Address mobile marketing – micro-moments are the new search marketing if your customers are browsing your products and services on a smartphone.

SEO & social

A few easy peasy tactics you can adopt:

• Build links with your social media channels, they are of high value to search engines… they might feel like a chore but they offer increased visibility.
• Quality of followers is key, it’s not about size any more. Fake likes will damage your reputation, so will clickbait articles.
• Use keywords and hashtags. 
• Local SEO is not to be sniffed at, especially if you offer a service to customers from your premises.
• Use keywords to drive content creation – what are your people talking about on social? Can you offer an article or a solution to a problem, current issue?
• Use slack periods to work on your editorial calendar. It’s all about seasons, anniversaries, fashion trends, buzzwords. Bear in mind your buyer’s cycle. For instance, gym memberships are often sold in December and January, while in the B2B universe January is the month for training.

Pic: Charlesjsharp

P.S. A little bird told me... the hummingbird update is not to be underestimated, it might not carry a ranking penalty but you have to bear it in mind because it's all about relevance. Find out what your customers' digital conversations are about and make your content relevant to them. If you want to find out more about this less talked-about animal, read this useful article.

Trying Twitter Polls - this time with a photo

For some weird reason you cannot have photos in Twitter Polls, so here is the Photo I would like to poll.... This is not a clickbait thingy, just want to know why this pic was rejected for a social media tweet...

What the SEO??? PPC explained

Project by mscherbear - Creative Commons

So I did an image search for PPC and this was the cutest... PPC as a keyword has serious issues image-wise at least in the Creative Commons Universe. But moving away from pretty ponies to PAY PER CLICK, I have found today a really good article about it. The article is giving information from a small business point of view and you can find it here.

This article (and the mentioned digital guide) resonates with me as I am mostly working with small businesses or for non-profit organisations with modest budgets. Plus as a content provider I am cheaper than hiring a PPC agency, which might backfire or be too costly. I still believe PPC is for promotions only, you need to think of SEO as a long-term objective and content marketing is the way to go. When I say content, I include videos, photos, infographics, memes, illustrations, not just WORDS.

Read the article and leave a comment if you wish. I'd welcome PPC experiences!

What the SEO??? PPC explained

Project by mscherbear - Creative Commons

So I did an image search for PPC and this was the cutest... PPC as a keyword has serious issues image-wise at least in the Creative Commons Universe. But moving away from pretty ponies to PAY PER CLICK, I have found today a really good article about it. The article is giving information from a small business point of view and you can find it here.

This article (and the mentioned digital guide) resonates with me as I am mostly working with small businesses or for non-profit organisations with modest budgets. Plus as a content provider I am cheaper than hiring a PPC agency, which might backfire or be too costly. I still believe PPC is for promotions only, you need to think of SEO as a long-term objective and content marketing is the way to go. When I say content, I include videos, photos, infographics, memes, illustrations, not just WORDS.

Read the article and leave a comment if you wish. I'd welcome PPC experiences!

In the SEO wonderland through the content keyhole

By KingaBritschgi

I have been quite busy building websites and optimizing them in the most natural way: concise and informative pages, good photography and keywords inserted appropriately in headlines, subheads and captions. I tend to spend a lot of time formatting photos for the web as the content management system Cambridge University uses (Falcon - Plone) has been set up with very specific image sizes for pages, side portlets and carousels. 

Some of my work has been updated by others who have followed me, but most of my work (or at least the bones) is still there to see. 

I have also devised Twitter and LinkedIn strategies, compiled newsletters (embedded e-newsletters and attachments) and given advice to a variety of businesses in the corporate sector. I particular like devising blog calendars and providing ideas for articles (or coaching somebody to write an article).

When building a new website it's important to minimize the number of main tabs and try to make the site navigable not confusing. With Falcon you can have menus popping down when you hover on a tab and various side panels. It has some limitations but it is easy to learn and has a special space for SEO code - ie Google Analytics and ways to tag images too.

In a previous job I managed to rank a company blog on the first page of Google with a single article. I have a screenshot somewhere to prove it and got 300 likes from a Facebook article. There was no magic involved, just quality writing diffusing useful information and a pinch of keywords judiciously scattered throughout without forcing them on the reader.

When I created a website for a biotech company, I experienced devising a two-level website with B2B and B2C pages. The B2B pages had more technical information and were aimed at doctors, while the B2C pages were written to create brand awareness among the consumers who might ask their doctor to use that particular brand of dermal filler. That is a crowded market with leaders willing to spend thousands of pounds so launching a new product on a shoestring budget is more of a challenge. The key is to do some competitor analysis beforehand so you can trump the competitor on something, not everybody can excell at everything so you can have a better blog than a bigger company and move faster because the content does not need to be signed off by as many executives and you don't have to deal with as many stakeholders either. You can really be an agile marketeer and strike the iron while it's hot!