Incorporating digital marketing into your business plan can yield incredible opportunities to reach new customers and grow. But it can be hard to decide what strategies to invest in, especially with so many options available and no clear place to start.
The first step is to build a digital marketing strategy that meets consumers exactly where they are. That means considering all stages of the marketing funnel — brand awareness, lead generation, and conversion. Each of these stages play a vital role in helping you stand out, attracting potential customers, and turning them into loyal clients.
In this article, the experts at Hyport Digital share the most effective strategies for digital marketing success at every stage of the funnel. Learn how to boost brand awareness, generate leads, and maximize conversions so your business can thrive both online and offline.
Brand Awareness: Attract Customers
Building brand awareness is an essential part of digital marketing for small businesses. It can be tempting to put your full marketing budget into generating leads, especially when you’re first starting out and aiming to quickly gain customers.
However, before you can generate quality leads, your audience needs to know who you are and the value you will provide to them.
In fact, a whopping 81% of consumers say that they need to trust a business before even considering buying from them (Edelman). That means it’s hard to build up a customer base when people don’t know who you and your business are. And in a crowded marketplace, establishing a strong brand presence is crucial to standing out and showing your audience that you are the business to choose.
Including brand awareness in digital marketing strategies for small businesses can:
- Capture the attention of potential customers
- Increase positive feelings associated with your brand, including reliability, authenticity, and overall quality
- Strengthen customer loyalty
- Help differentiate your business from competitors
- Build trust and credibility
Brand awareness helps establish a strong foundation for long-term success. Here are 5 digital marketing strategies for small businesses to use when building up brand awareness and attracting new customers.
Mobile and Display Advertising
Mobile and display ads, also known as “banner ads”, are a great way to keep you top of mind as potential customers are browsing the web. You can think of this strategy as a virtual billboard promoting your business and brand on a digital highway.
Display advertising allows you to utilize both detailed targeting parameters to reach your ideal prospects and visuals that catch the eye of potential customers. By showing up on websites that your potential customers are already browsing, display ads increase visibility and build trust and familiarity with your brand over time.
Acquisition Email Marketing
If you’re wanting to build brand awareness more directly, acquisition email marketing may be the way to go. Unlike other forms of digital marketing for small businesses, emails land right in the inboxes of potential customers, making them more likely to be noticed.
Unlike traditional email marketing, acquisition emails are sent to people who are not already in your email database but fit the parameters of your target audience. This personalized and direct approach can help you grab the attention of potential customers and efficiently communicate your brand message.
“Over-the-Top”/Connected TV Advertising
“Over-the-Top”/Connected TV advertising, also known as OTT or CTV, allows you to reach potential customers directly through commercials on streaming services. As of 2023, 83% of households paid for at least one video streaming service (Forbes), making TV commercials a thing of the past and OTT an even more effective strategy.
Unlike traditional TV commercials that are served to everyone, OTT focuses on serving ads to people who fit into your target audience. And the best part? Viewers are not able to skip or fast forward through OTT commercials, making it a strategy that both seamlessly integrates into your audience’s viewing experience and captures their attention for a short period of time.
Yelp Enhanced Profile
Many consumers use Yelp as a way to find the most trusted and quality businesses to work with. With the features of an Enhanced Profile on Yelp, you’ll stand out prominently on one of the most trusted consumer platforms and better communicate who you are to potential customers.
Enhanced Profiles offer features like Highlights and Portfolios that provide a detailed look into the values of your business and enhance overall visibility. Yelp’s robust review system also encourages customer feedback and interaction that can boost your brand’s level of authenticity.
Paid Social Media Advertising
Running a brand awareness campaign on social media platforms such as Facebook or Instagram can help your business reach a large audience of potential customers. One of the biggest benefits of this strategy lies in its targeting capabilities, allowing businesses to create highly targeted ads that are shown the right demographics, locations, and even interests or behaviors related to your business.
The visual aspect of paid social media advertising is also a big plus. You’ll catch the eye of potential customers and encourage future interactions the next time they see your ad, which can help drive both immediate and long-term business growth.
Lead Generation: Drive Customer Engagement
Lead generation is one of the most important parts of any marketing strategy. If you’re not generating a loyal customer base, your business cannot survive.
When it comes to digital marketing for small businesses, lead generation is not just about attracting random visitors to your website. It’s about finding the right people who are genuinely interested in what you have to offer. That means investing in marketing strategies that meet people where they are and encourage them to consider doing business with you.
Including lead generation in digital marketing strategies for small businesses can:
- Expand your customer base
- Drive sales and support revenue growth
- Maximize the effectiveness of your digital marketing
- Lay a powerful foundation for conversion
By investing in lead generation strategies, you can set yourself up for success in transforming potential customers into lifelong customers. Here are 4 digital marketing strategies you can use to foster lead generation.
Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
Search engine marketing (SEM) is one of the most effective ways to generate leads when it comes to digital marketing for small businesses. It targets users who are actively searching for products or services related to your business and serves them your ad at the top of the search results page on search engines like Google.
This means that you are targeting high-intent searchers who are looking to do business with someone soon. And by making sure your business is the one showing up prominently at the top of the search results page, you’ll encourage consumers to choose you.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the ongoing process of improving the organic ranking of your website on search engines such as Google. Similarly to SEM, making sure your business is prominently displayed at the top of the search results page encourages potential customers to choose you when considering who to do business with — especially because only 6.6% of people are willing to go past the first page of Google when looking for information or services (Teknicks).
Investing in SEO builds long-term credibility and authority for businesses, which makes it a unique digital marketing strategy for small businesses that can lead to more long term success in lead generation.
Paid Social Media
Paid social ads are not only a great way to increase brand awareness and engagement among potential customers, but they are also a great way to generate quality leads. Facebook Lead Generation campaigns are specifically designed to capture leads through a form as people are scrolling through their feed.
One of the best parts of paid social media marketing is the detailed targeting capabilities that come with it. You’ll catch the attention of potential customers in your most ideal audience with expertly designed ads and visuals.
Yelp CPC Advertising
Consumers with a high intent to purchase a product or service are the ones who use Yelp. If you’re utilizing Yelp CPC ads, or “Cost-per-Click” ads, you’ll be one of the first businesses to appear in consumer searches — and therefore more likely to generate quality leads.
About 57% of Yelp users contact businesses they find on the platform within a day of their search (Yelp), making showing up first on the Yelp results page crucial to lead generation success. And with Yelp’s location targeting capabilities, you’ll be visible to consumers in your local area who are ready to work with you.
Conversion: Turn Prospects into Customers
Brand awareness and lead generation strategies are key to attracting customers and convincing them to consider doing business with you — but how do you actually convert them into customers?
Without keeping ease of conversion in mind when crafting your marketing plan, you’ll miss out on interested consumers who are ready to make a purchase. That’s why it’s essential to incorporate into digital marketing strategies for small businesses.
Conversion strategies help in reducing friction and restrictions that might cause potential customers to abandon your sales funnel. Here are 2 strategies to make sure you’re turning interested consumers into loyal customers.
Website Optimization
A study by Forbes Advisor shows that 61% of consumers will leave a website if they don’t find what they’re looking for within 5 seconds. This makes it essential for your website to be fully optimized to give consumers the information and options they are seeking from you — or else they’ll move on to your competitors.
It’s important to provide a seamless experience for potential customers that encourages them to take action and makes it easy to do so. Clear calls-to-action, such as your phone number in the top right corner of the screen, and easy navigation can guide users towards conversion points and make it simple for them to become customers.
Live Chat
If consumers have questions and you’re not easily available to answer them, they’ll likely move on to the next business they find. That’s where implementing a live chat function on your website becomes a crucial part of your customer journey.
Live chat functions as a way to swiftly and easily resolve customer questions or concerns and build trust with them. The easier it is to get in contact with you or your business, the more likely they are to become lifelong customers.
Learn More About Digital Marketing Strategies at Hyport Digital
At Hyport Digital, we are experts in digital marketing for small businesses. We’re committed to creating and managing effective digital marketing strategies that drive business growth and success, both long-term and short-term. If you’re interested in any of the strategies above, or want to learn more about our offerings, contact us today for a free consultation!
