The average person spends over eight hours a day online, equating to roughly 128 days annually. Surprising, isn’t it? Yet upon reflection, it shouldn’t be…
Nearly everything we do involves the internet. From professional research to connecting with family on social media, to our latest streaming binges—they all rely on the world wide web.
What does this mean for you as a small business owner, freelancer, or marketing professional? It suggests that potential customers are likely to discover your brand online before ever setting foot in your store or hearing your ad on traditional media. This is crucial!
To thrive in 2024 and beyond, you need to engage in strategic online presence management for your brand. Read on, and we’ll guide you through the process!
Table of Contents
What is Online Presence Management?
Online presence management is the process of curating a brand’s digital footprint to ensure a positive overall sentiment surrounds it.
This encompasses updating brand-owned websites and social media profiles, generating and addressing online reviews, and even hosting virtual events. Essentially, if it relates to your brand’s online reputation, it falls under online presence management.
How to Properly Manage Your Online Presence
Effective online presence management can lead to an enhanced online reputation, increased website traffic, and ultimately, more customers for your brand. So, how do you manage your brand’s online presence effectively? These tips will guide you:
Your Website
Begin by evaluating your brand’s website.
Does it welcome potential customers and entice them to stay? If it’s poorly designed, difficult to navigate, and filled with subpar content, the answer is likely no.
When upgrading your website, ensure it’s optimized for mobile devices and includes:
Stellar Design and Imagery Accurate and Relevant Content Positive Customer Testimonials Clear Calls-to-Action (CTAs) Strategic SEO Elements
To create an effective website, you must understand your target audience. This allows you to design something that attracts the right people and communicates with them appropriately.
Let’s say, for example, your company sells custom-built motorcycles. Given that 81% of motorcycle riders are male, you probably wouldn’t want to create a pink website or write blog posts about the “most romantic motorcycle rides in the USA”.
Why? Because these elements likely won’t appeal to the majority of motorcycle enthusiasts, i.e., your target audience. Of course, you’ll need to research your own customers to determine what they want from your brand. Then, strive to deliver these elements.
Social Media
Social media is a vital business tool that enables brands to connect directly with their customers and build lasting relationships. However, consistent posting can be challenging when juggling other business-related tasks.
Here’s the thing: your brand’s social media profiles play a crucial role in your online presence management strategy. As such, they shouldn’t be neglected.
Strive to post quality content on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Then, engage with the comments you receive. This is vital! Your social channels should spark interaction between you and your audience. Avoid using them as one-way message boards.
What constitutes “quality content”? It depends on your brand, but here are some ideas:
Links to relevant industry articles Entertaining videos and memes related to your field Positive testimonials from satisfied customers Sales, discount offers, and other promotions Employee spotlights and behind-the-scenes updates
The key is to publish such content regularly. This doesn’t mean posting twice daily, seven days a week. Instead, find a posting schedule that works for your brand and stick to it as best you can.
Pro Tip: There are hundreds of social media platforms on the internet. Don’t try to join them all. Focus on the ones your target audience uses most frequently. Then engage them on these platforms consistently. It’s better to maintain a strong presence on one or two sites than to be inconsistent across many.
Online Reviews
Your brand’s online reviews are a critical aspect of your online presence management.
Consider this: 89% of consumers read reviews before purchasing a product. And 79% of shoppers say they trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations.
What does this mean for your brand? Reviews matter significantly to your target audience, which means they should matter to you too. Use this four-step strategy to generate more reviews for your business and amplify the impact of existing ones:
Respond to Every Review: 97% of people who read reviews also read responses to reviews. By responding to every online review your brand receives, good and bad, you’ll demonstrate to potential customers that your brand values their input. Ask Customers For Reviews: The most effective way to generate more online reviews is simply to ask your customers. Studies suggest that 70% of customers will leave a review if a brand requests it. Don’t miss this opportunity! Display Your Positive Reviews: Online reviews are powerful, so use them to propel your business forward. Showcase glowing reviews on your website and share them on social media. This will enhance your online reputation. Use the Feedback You Receive: Finally, learn from the reviews you get. Do many customers share similar complaints? Address these issues. Do most reviewers mention a specific feature they enjoy? Continue to provide and improve it.
To succeed at online presence management, you must learn how to consistently generate positive reviews and leverage them effectively.
Search Engine Optimization
Search engine optimization is crucial for online presence management as well.
If you’re unfamiliar with the term, search engine optimization, commonly known as SEO, is the process of enhancing a website to improve its ranking in search engine results.
The higher your website ranks for specific keywords, the more traffic you can drive to your site and the better reputation your brand will enjoy. Of course, achieving high rankings is challenging—especially for high-volume keywords. This is due to fierce competition.
Don’t let that deter you! Use these three tips to improve your website ranking:
- Optimize For Keywords: Keywords are the words and phrases that people type into search engines to find information. If you were looking for new footwear, for example, you might type “Men’s Black Shoes” into Google. You need to identify the keywords your target audience uses. Then incorporate them naturally into your brand’s website content. Start a Company Blog: Blogging is an excellent way to boost your website’s SEO efforts. By targeting specific keywords in your blog posts, you give your site additional opportunities to rank in search results for those terms. Just remember to avoid keyword-stuffing, i.e., including as many keywords as possible without regard for readability and flow. Google My Business: If you run a local business, you definitely need a Google My Business profile, which will help your website appear in Google search results. Provide as much information as possible in your Google listing, including your company’s name, address, contact details, hours of operation, and photos.
- SEO is a long-term strategy. Don’t expect to publish one blog post and immediately start ranking for its chosen keyword. It requires time and consistent effort. But if you persist, you’ll reap the rewards.
Virtual Events
Lastly, hosting virtual events such as webinars and industry conferences can significantly improve your online presence. It’s one of the most effective ways to engage your audience!
There are a few key elements needed to host a successful virtual event. These include the right software, valuable content to share, and an audience to market your event to. Let’s examine each of these in more detail:
The Right Software
You need reliable software to host a virtual event. While there are numerous options available, few can match ClickMeeting in terms of usability and features.
Our software enables you to host intimate gatherings or large-scale events for 1,000+ attendees. Regardless of your event size, you’ll have access to audience engagement features like custom branding, screen sharing, in-app chat, polls and surveys, social media streaming, virtual event recording, and detailed analytics.
The best part? You can try ClickMeeting for free right now. Sign up for a 30-day trial to see if our software meets your needs.
Valuable Content
Why should people attend your virtual event? The only correct answer is because they’re going to learn something valuable from you that they didn’t know before. It could be a new skill, a new process, a new way to save money on your products—anything really.
Ask yourself this question: “What does my audience want from my brand?” Then deliver this to them during your webinar or virtual conference.
For example, people come to ClickMeeting to get access to the best webinar and virtual event software on the market (see above.) If we were to host a virtual event of our own, we could teach people how to host amazing webinars with our platform. Or how to market a virtual event and make sure people show up. Or how to save 25% on a subscription to ClickMeeting.
You can’t use virtual events to improve your online presence without valuable content.
An Audience
Who is your virtual event for? If you don’t know who your target audience is, it will be extremely difficult for you to market your event and get people to come.
When you know who your audience is, you can start promoting your virtual event to them via email, social media, blogs on your website, paid ads on Google and Facebook, flyers around your hometown—the way you promote really depends on your unique event and audience.
The point is, take a moment to identify your audience. Then find ways to reach these people.
3 Tips For Online Presence Management
1. Aim For Consistency
First, make sure your brand is consistent across all platforms, from your website to your social media channels to the virtual events you and your team host.
If a potential customer visits your website, then clicks on a link to your Instagram page, they shouldn’t feel like they’re looking at two different companies. Color schemes, tone of voice, content types, etc. should be similar—not exactly the same, but similar.
This kind of consistency builds trust between companies and their customers. Since it’s extremely hard to make sales without trust, you should definitely keep this in mind.
2. Increase Your Activity
Once you get the hang of online presence management, look to increase your activity.
When we say “increase your activity” we mean, post more on social media, publish more blog posts, host more virtual events, and otherwise engage with your audience more frequently.
Doing so will give you additional opportunities to build relationships, prove your authority, boost your brand’s reputation, and turn strangers into paying customers.
3. Ask For Feedback
Last, but certainly not least, ask your customers how to improve your online presence. This is especially important if your brand’s reputation is down in the dumps.
But you can’t just ask, you have to act. When you receive feedback, use it to improve your brand’s online presence. Make the changes your customers suggest. Then measure the results. Did it work? If so, keep doing what you’re doing. If not, go back to the drawing board.
Wrapping Up
Online presence management is essential in 2021.
If you don’t work hard to build and maintain your brand’s reputation on the internet, your company will never be as successful as you want it to be.
Fortunately, online presence management isn’t as difficult as you might think it is. Yes, it will take effort. But if you implement the tips and tricks we shared with you in this article, your online presence will improve—we guarantee it. Good luck!
Loading...
