Improve Your Brand’s Online Presence with these Evergreen Tips.

It was a friend’s bridal shower and I wanted to get her a nice gift. 

Unsure of where to get the best quality jewellery set in her city, I immediately checked Instagram for a brand someone had recommended. Quite impressed with the outlook of their page and I had even found a particular piece that attracted me, but I still kept scrolling and reading through the comments. Can you guess what I was searching for? I was looking to see what people had said about their products and brand in general.

Creating and constantly improving your brand’s online presence is non-negotiable for any business looking to survive and thrive in this generation. One of the most prevailing struggles of newly launched brands is how to get traction on social media and other online platforms. This article will take you through some of the essential things you must do if your goal is to improve your brand’s online presence whether as a new or existing brand.

With These Practises You Can Improve Your Brand’s Online Presence.

Invest in a Top-Notch Website

A website is an asset every brand must-have. It can be as simple as a one-page website or could run into as many pages and functionalities as you’ll be needing. Even if you do not offer any online services, there’s no excuse to lack a professional website as a serious brand. Your website should serve as an information centre where customers and prospects can get accurate information about your brand and how you operate.

Regardless of how simple you want your website to be, it must have all the elements of a brilliant website, such as aesthetics, user-friendliness, responsiveness, security, well-written copy, etc. Having a blog section on your website is also a bonus as it can help you drive traffic to your site and serve as a knowledge bank. Would you love to create a new corporate website or revamp an old one? We’ll love to work with you on that; get in touch with us.

 

Set-Up Your Google My Business

Google My Business is one of the ways in which customers can find any business they’ll love to patronise. Interestingly, it is a free platform that lists your business, shows you on Google Search and Maps, gives prospects information about your business and how they can contact you. You can also show off photos of your business and inform people of upcoming activities. This is one sure way to improve your brand’s online presence. Setting up your account doesn’t take so long at all.

Build a Personal Brand

Apart from being the owner or founder of a business, there’s more to you. And that’s what people are curious about. Help the public get to know you as an individual with unique values and a personality. They want to learn from your knowledge, experiences, activities, and get to know you outside what you portray as a business owner. Their interaction with you has a huge impact on your business in the end. While building your personal brand, you must also be strategic about it, identify and clarify your message, viewpoint, mission, vision, and passion. Here’s also a great opportunity to share more personal stories, show off your family, hobbies, and life outside work. In most cases, those who interact with your personal brand will end up becoming loyal fans of your business because they have some level of trust and believe in what you do. 

It is very important to also encourage your employees to create their personal brand. This is so because apart from them publishing what they do on a personal level, they’ll at some point mention the work they do for your company and how they are a part of something as incredible as your business. Beyond that, their friends and network are more likely to patronise your brand as a way to support them or acknowledge their expertise.

We’ve talked extensively about personal branding here, you should check it out.

Separate Your Personal Brand from Corporate Brand

Some new brands are torn between using their already existing social media pages for their brand. Resist the urge to do this. Some pieces of content are great for a personal social media page but won’t be suitable on an official brand page. Put in the work to build an online community that has intentionally identified as a fan of your corporate brand. This is the only way you can get them to support and be loyal advocates of your brand. It’s as simple as that. 

 

Be Impeccable both Online and Offline

Do everything it takes to ensure that every touchpoint of your brand cannot be flawed. Even when a customer was served offline, they can rant about an unpleasant experience online and mention your brand. This alone will make you lose customers and potential customers who might not be interested in hearing you out. To prevent such occurrences, ensure your service/product, customer service and support, response time, delivery, and every other aspect, both online and offline, are satisfactory.

Engage in Social Listening

How do you know what online users are saying about your brand? Your Social Media Manager or Public Relations Personnel must always engage in social listening. Well, if you slack in this area, be aware that some prospects search for your mentions before they patronise you. Failure to respond to or address controversial issues where you have been mentioned can give prospects the wrong opinion about your brand. There are some effective tools you can try out if you’ll love to practise social listening. Some of them include Google Alert, Hootsuite, Buffer, SocialPilot, etc.

Concentrate on Customer Retention

Getting new clients is very important to the continuous operation of your business. However, you’ll be running in circles if you are unable to retain most of your previous clients (if not all). Sourcing for new clients consumes both time and other limited resources – so why don’t you also put in the same energy in retaining the ones you have and turning them into die-hard fans of your brand. If you are having a difficult time retaining your customers, you must be aware of some proven customer retention strategies you’ve been overlooking for so long.

In everything you do while trying to improve your brand’s online presence, content marketing is very essential. Leverage customers’ testimonials to build trust and be open-minded enough to explore various online marketing platforms and business listing sites. We’d love to know what tips or strategies you practise while trying to improve your brand’s online presence. We can’t wait to read them in the comment section.