In the past few decades, small entrepreneurs never got a chance to compete in the market. From budget limitations to the lack of resources – big businesses always had a monopoly. After all, the only way to grab audiences’ attention was by spending heaps of money on television commercials and billboards. Unsurprisingly, this wasn’t possible for small businesses, but things are changing in the 21st century – all thanks to technological advancements.

The emergence of digital media and smartphones is changing how people engage, interact, and shop. Social media forums are letting brands build business profiles, while search engines open doors to a whole new online advertisement world. Earlier, online marketing was a different way to promote products, but now it has become inevitable for businesses.

Digital marketing lays a foundation on which entrepreneurs build their presence. It establishes their position in communities and niches, creating brand awareness amongst audiences without costing a fortune. In short, it is an opportunity for small businesses to become a part of the industry and win their market share by breaking monopolies.

However, now digital marketing is beyond running ads or having a website. It is more about leveraging tech-savvy tools and analytics to conduct market research and gain an edge over competitors. And your failure to acknowledge its significance can drive you out of the competition. Let us look at the importance of digital marketing and why your small business needs it to grow and thrive.

1. BUILDS BRAND RECOGNITION

These days, it is quite impossible to attract customers by sending out pamphlets and business cards. Since people have a strong presence on online platforms, they expect the same from every small brick and mortar business. Therefore, focus on building brand recognition by exhibiting your presence across multiple marketing channels. Are you clueless about it? Have a look at this marketing guide and learn the ropes.

Firstly, create business profiles on the search engine, social media, and other digital tools. Use the power of content marketing to spread your brand message across. Consistent branding across multiple networks reflects a positive brand image. Remember, customers have a plethora of options in the online world. If they didn’t find your brand, it would take them two minutes to find a substitute and switch. Hence, utilize social media – Facebook, Instagram, etc. to build brand recognition amongst audiences. A great idea is to hire a professional video production company like Signature Video Group and make videos that will promote your brand or your get you noticed by potential customers.

2. TARGETS RIGHT AUDIENCES

When it comes to running a billboard campaign, brands have some target audience in mind. Unfortunately, you don’t have any control over whether that target audience would see the advertisement or not. Amongst the million benefits of digital marketing, targeting the right audience is likely to be the best one. It lets you break clusters into small and focused groups while allowing you to engage with them.

You can run a survey, start a conversation under the comment section, and offer customers solutions. For running advertisements, select demographics – age, gender, location, religion, and interests to connect with potential customers. If you have a women’s apparel brand, the target audience will be mostly women aging 18 to 45 years or above active online shoppers. It helps you reach out to people who have a keen interest in your product offerings, boosting sales and profits.

3. EASY TO SCALE & ADAPT

Every marketing campaign requires initial investment to get the traffic flowing, but surprisingly, this is not how digital marketing works. It doesn’t cost a dime to create a business profile on any social forum, nor you have to spend any money on forming community groups. Only social campaigns, advertisements, and sponsored posts cost you a few bucks. You can choose a daily budget, which can be as low as $1, and schedule the ad.

Similarly, if you see the ad doing well instead of renegotiating the deal, you can keep the ad running by increasing your budget. All these marketing campaigns provide instant results. From the number of people who clicked on your ad to possible conversions – you can analyze data and make informed decisions. The significance of digital marketing to small business becomes more prominent when you recognize how simple it is to grow business online.

4. LEARN FROM COMPETITION

Believe it or not, audiences turn to brands that offer discounts, initiate trends, and provide reliable customer service. Therefore, if you want to win an edge, adopt a different perspective towards your competitors. Instead of seeing them as someone you want to beat, look up to them as a learning opportunity. Are they using content marketing? What is their mode of communication with clients?

With the help of digital marketing, you can find answers to all these questions. Feel free to surf through their website, blogs, and social media pages to track their performance. It will make you apprehend how actively they respond to changing tastes while fostering interactions with customers. Remember, the aim is not to copy your competitors but to learn from their mistakes.

5. PROVIDES REAL-TIME CUSTOMER SERVICE

With utmost reliance on the digital world, customers need support at every step of their buying journey. Alongside providing contact details or email address, use savvy tools to provide real-time customer service. You can hire customer support representatives to assist your social media followers. They would collect responses, answer queries, and take feedback from customers. After all, customer satisfaction is a critical point in establishing an outright market presence.

Moreover, you can also leverage artificial intelligence (AI) or machine learning to streamline customer support. It uses human intelligence to provide human-like responses for answering customer queries. It means bots will be catering to queries and helping people make purchase decisions. Although you can integrate AI with social profiles, consider adding live chat options on your website. It will help visitors find products while instantly getting answers to their questions, boosting sales.

6. ENGAGES CUSTOMERS

Unlike conventional practices, digital marketing offers two-way communication. Brands get to promote, and customers respond with comments and feedback. As a result, the online audience has a lot of power in their hands. In addition to promotions, small businesses have to focus on building relationships with clients. If you are wondering how? Have a look below.

i. Initiate conversations on social platforms. You can start a Q&A session through live video to learn more about your potential customers.

ii. If you are bringing a new product, use online polls to get an idea about what customers want.

iii. Run surveys to get honest feedback and reviews of your customers.

Iv. Create online quizzes to learn more about visitors.

Unsurprisingly, customers appreciate the attention and prompt replies. They are more willing to trust a business when they get honest answers to their questions. Thus, interact and engage with them on a personal level to establish brand loyalty.

7. OFFERS A PERSONALIZED EXPERIENCE

Earlier marketing was more about trial and error. Marketers were devising campaigns by following their gut and instinct, but everything has a reason in this digital era. Customers are feeding businesses information round the clock by signing up for newsletters and filling questionnaires. As a result, they await brands to treat them as individuals. Fortunately, digital marketing lets businesses segment markets and offers a personalized experience to customers.

In addition to generating leads, you can use this as your unique selling proposition. If you use email marketing, personalize emails by adding the first name of every customer. Likewise, recognize customers on individual levels – understand their preference, check their purchase history, and customize ads for them. For instance, if a visitor has abandoned his cart, send an ‘email’ with a special discount offer, or remind them of their cart. You can also send an online SMS, as mobile marketing is an extremely effective channel.

8. EXPANDS CUSTOMER OUTREACH

Every business wishes to expand globally, but would that be possible with a store in one corner of the city. Your offerings and services should be for the people of that region and the people around the world. It can put your business on a global forum where people from all around the world can shop from your brand. After all, Google, Facebook, Twitter, Amazon are all international forums accessible by everyone.

If expansion is on your bucket list, devise a digital globalization strategy. Before stepping overseas, concentrate on local expansion by making your products and services available nationwide. Similarly, use social media to set demographics of another country and start promoting. Join hands with a reputable logistics company and cherish your versatile customer base.

9. ENJOY HIGHER ROI

Digital marketing offers a higher return on investment (ROI) than any other type of marketing. It is an ideal opportunity for small businesses to make the most out of a limited marketing budget. Let us unwind the returns of every campaign one by one.

i. Email marketing offers the peak ROI since it works like a conversion machine. Build an email list with quality subscribers and deliver high-quality content.

ii. Content marketing generates three times more leads than television commercials or any other traditional marketing campaign. Alongside website traffic, it brings buyers to your website.

iii. Social media establishes brand image and turns leads into potential customers.

While operating a small business, you have to ensure budget-friendliness. Learn how to stretch every dollar as you grow your brand because each cent counts. Understand the costs and see whether it would provide you with a sufficient ROI.

FINAL THOUGHTS

As a small business holder, you would have multiple questions regarding the benefits of digital marketing. From increasing customer outreach, developing brand image, improving customer service to saving money – digital marketing provides a pathway to success. Hence, look for smaller ways to jump into it. Create a social media account, list your business on Google, develop a web page, and see its impact on your business. With all these overwhelming benefits, what is stopping you from marketing your business online?

AUTHOR BIO:

Danish Mehmood is a senior SEO strategist at a web development and digital marketing agency based in Orlando, FL. He is passionate about digital marketing and loves to analyze the SEO industry in his spare time and stay in touch with the latest happenings. Connect with him at @InboundDM on Twitter and on LinkedIn. 

An increasing number of people are venturing into the business world. The idea of owning a small business is gaining acceptance. E-companies are replacing brick and mortar firms, and many people are taking benefits of technology and turning their ideas into reality. People running small businesses have their limitations as they do not have the liberty to spend a lot of money, and they need to be vigilant about their expenses. Moreover, businesses do not start churning out profit overnight, and entrepreneurs have to put in earnest efforts and long working hours before seeing fruitful results.

Marketing is a crucial element of running a company, and in this fierce competition of the business world, small companies have to fight tooth and nail to make a name for themselves. Today, people have excess options, and small businesses have to indulge in extensive marketing to make their presence known. Small companies cannot dedicate a large sum of money to marketing, as they have a limited budget. Marketing technology, commonly referred to as Martech, applies to all initiatives, channels, and tools that harness technology to achieve marketing objectives. Small businesses can use Martech and change the game for themselves.

The following are some of the benefits of marketing technology for small businesses:

1. Higher Conversion Rates

Irrespective of your niche, every small business’s motive is to generate more sales and earn more revenue. Conversion rate tells you about the percentage of visitors that visited your website and took the desired action. Digital marketing enables a small business to achieve higher conversion rates in less duration. Marketing technology helps generate leads and get higher sales through a proper sales funnel.

Small business owners can be innovative with their strategies and try different digital marketing methods to boost conversion rates. Blogging is an effective way of luring customers into purchasing on your website. Unique and informative content on blogs can hike up conversion rates and make a small business successful. Companies can use online tools to view blogging stats, determine keywords and sites ranking high on SERPs, and develop content accordingly.

• Increased Brand Visibility

Small businesses often struggle in establishing a strong brand identity as other big fish often dominate the space. Digital marketing can help to increase small businesses’ visibility online and enhance their reach. Making people aware that your brand exists is the first step that exposes them to your products and services. The effective use of Martech succeeds in igniting interest in the audience to check out your products. Increased brand visibility can put a small company parallel to big fish in the market by exposing them to the same target audience. Or even more, if you’re offering additional value.

• Better Customer Experience

Strong customer bonds are the key to success, and Martech has helped companies give their customers enriching experiences. Martech has introduced multiple channels that enable companies to reach their customers and gain insights into their experiences. Customers can use channels like email, social media, or company websites to contact brands for their queries, and brands can use this as an opportunity to strengthen their bonds with them.

Good customer service turns customers into a marketing tool, as they recommend your brand in their social circle leading to widespread word-of-mouth marketing. And we all know that WoM and positive referrals are excellent!

• Enhanced Business Relationships

Businesses can run on their own, but in the modern world, survival without taking other businesses’ support means an extra load of work. Today, entrepreneurs can have a computer and a robust Internet connection, and they can search for like-minded people for their companies. Martech supports small businesses in establishing strong business relationships, and they can also take advantage of technological tools to enhance existing bonds.

Supposedly, as a retailer, you can search for companies that provide coupon codes and collaborate with them. This way, you can give discounts to your customers. The win-win strategy has always benefitted businesses, and Martech provides business owners with multiple opportunities to devise a win-win plan.

• Automated Marketing

One of the best advantages of applying marketing technology to a small business is automation. Small companies can now take a backseat and let technology handle their marketing. This includes collecting data and running highly targeted ad campaigns.

• Easy Access

We live in a technologically advanced world. People prefer staying in their homes and browsing options without stepping out. Online shoppers make up a considerable percentage of today’s customer base, and through Martech, small businesses give them easy access to products online. Advanced technology makes small companies more accessible and helps them attract more people.  

• Accurate Measurements

Business owners have to face difficulties in taking precise measurements of their marketing efforts, which primarily affects their budgets and marketing strategies. Marketing technology has enabled small business owners to integrate software and other tools, giving them accurate measurements of their marketing KPIs and strategy. Key matrices and other tools are significant in measuring effectiveness, and in the light of these measurements, small business owners can devise their different techniques. Besides, it helps business owners to stay aware of the outcomes of their marketing endeavors precisely.

Conclusion

Technology has become essential for small businesses to survive in today’s cut-throat competition. Marketing technology is robust, and small business owners can use advanced technical tools and channels to put their companies ahead of their competitors.

Working remotely and being able to create your own schedule is something we’ve all heard about, but nobody could anticipate how common this idea would become in 2020. With so many people being quarantined and not being able to leave their homes, we’re all slowly turning into remote workers, whether we like it or not. However, those original digital nomads – i.e. the people who work while traveling around the world because they want to and not because they have to – are still everywhere around us, introducing changes into traditional business models and doing things their own way. One of them is Andy Sto. Andy is a digital nomad and remote work enthusiast. He believes that digital nomads are the future of remote work and has been traveling to various locations around the world for the past six years while running a full-time remote digital marketing agency, Sendabee. Andy is interested in cultural differences and the local mindset of each destination he lives in. He also enjoys hiking in nature and discovering hidden gems in the places he visits.

 So, whether you’re one of these remote workers or someone who’s thinking about hiring them, here are a few benefits of this concept you need to know.

Ultimate freedom

Instead of working from 9 to 5 and spending hours commuting every single day, working from home means you can create your own schedule and come up with the setup that works for you the most. If you want to, you can get up at noon, stay in your pyjamas, download the latest GTA 5 realistic car mod and play video games all day long – as long as you complete your projects on time, you can do basically whatever you want!

This kind of freedom is something people in the past knew nothing about, but creating your own schedule and doing things your own way can be more beneficial than you can imagine. You’ll feel relaxed and well-rested, and that’s the best way to boost your motivation and become more productive than you’ve ever been. In the end, feeling that way will help you do more work in less time, which is why so many people actually prefer working from home whenever they can.

No more expenses

It doesn’t matter where you work and how long it takes you to reach your office – doing this day after day means you have to spend tons of money just to get to your work in the morning and then return back home in the afternoon. And it doesn’t really matter how you’re doing that because every form of transportation costs quite a lot in this day and age – except if you’re using your bike.

But, if you work from home or work remotely, you won’t have to spend money on transportation. You’ll just have to work from your bedroom to your kitchen, your living room, your outdoor deck, or any other space you’ve converted into a home office. You’ll also save money on food and clothes because you won’t have to buy new work clothes anymore, and that’s always a great way to boost your monthly budget.

Explore the world

In case you decide to turn into a real digital nomad and work while traveling the world, find a way to make the most of this idea. Doing this isn’t easy, and it will take some getting used to, but once you adapt to this lifestyle, you’ll be able to make it work.

You can travel wherever you want to and have as many new adventures as you want, and still be the employee of the month. You just have to find a place to stay while traveling – for instance, a comfortable studio apartment that comes with all the amenities you may need is an awesome solution – and make sure you get some work done every single day.

Explore new careers

If you’re tired of your job and the people you’re working with, making a change is a must. And the best way to introduce a massive change into your life is to change your job and become a digital nomad. What’s great, though, is that life as a digital nomad can give you more opportunities than you can anticipate, and finding a new career shouldn’t be too hard.

Depending on your preferences, skills, knowledge, and previous work experience, you can pick different industries and businesses, from IT and marketing to administration and software management. Doing something you’ve never done before might be challenging, but if you’re dedicated to your new job and exploring the life of a digital nomad, this might be the best decision of your life. 

The best thing about this idea isn’t the number of people who are living as digital nomads at the moment, but the number of people who are going to become digital nomads in the future – ultimately, this is the biggest reason why you too should join this movement today!