Choosing the right place to start your business online
With so many options and opportunities online. It might sometimes be confusing in choosing the right place to start your business online. One major advantage of the internet is that it provides convenient access to a global market for people and businesses. This is why it's known as the world wide web providing opportunities for networking and so much more.
So in choosing the right place to start your business online listed below are important factors to carefully consider.
1. Understand your market: Discover where your target audience spends more time online and focus on being noticed there.
2. Understand your scope- How you want to start and where do you want to go. Decide if you will handle the technical and creative aspects of your digital presence or get help.
3. Budgeting: Have a budgeting plan so you put insufficient resources to yield results. In the online world relevance matters, a lot and consistency with the right strategy will help you get relevance, so you need to understand what it will cost you to maintain business operations online as not being relevant will cost you a lot.
4. Clearly define what you want people to do online when they come in contact with your business and how best it would happen.
5. Understand your industry: Apart from clearly outlining what you want out of your business online, you might need to consider what others(the competition) in your Industry are doing so you have the right information to help you plan on how to stay profitable and sustainable.
So now let’s look at the basic forms in which your business or brand could get visible and accessible online.
They include:
Website
Local Directories
Mobile App
Social Media
WEBSITE
In building your website for your business the key thing is to decide what your website needs to do to support your business goals
Keynote for website design: Imagine you’re a visitor Ask yourself why am I here? What am I trying to do? What problem am I trying to solve?
These key considerations will help you determine what kind of features or website will support your business goals.
Basic things to consider when building a website
1. Navigation – you need to ensure that your users get the best experience when browsing your site, therefore you need to provide a consistent layout with similar fonts, images, a search box and others.
2. Responsive design (Mobile Friendliness) – Without a doubt, we know lots of people browse the internet using a mobile phone. Therefore your website will need the right technologies to help it load fast and adapt to different screen sizes to ensure that mobile users can access your website.
3. UI/UX Design: Your digital shop will need to interact with users easily to help them achieve their goals on your website. So you will also need to highlight this to your website developer. (UI – User Interface; UE- User experience).
4. You will need a Content Management Plan/Strategy.
LOCAL DIRECTORIES
Local Directories like Google My Business are one of the easiest ways your business could be found online through search engines or online maps.
They Usually Feature
1. Your business name
2. Address
3. Phone number
4. Geo location guide/ GPS direction
5. Opening/Working Hours
6. A short description of what you do or offer.
MOBILE APP
One important use of mobile apps is that there are some services and business goals that would be better served on an app – commonly to drive sales and also improve customers’ loyalty.
Common Features of Mobile Apps
– Map / GPS – This could give direction to customers so they could visit you or do shopping in your physical store.
– Push Notifications: This can act as a reminder to your customers so they can claim offers or get info about the latest services/products available.
– Booking/Reservations – Customers could easily make a booking or reservations on any of your services or products through apps.
– Conversations – This could help build a better relationship with your customers since they will be able to make quick enquires or complaints to you through your mobile app.
SOCIAL MEDIA
In deciding which social network to begin, you have to consider which one houses your customers the most- is it Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn? Also, you will need to pay attention to what works there-from the kind of personalities found there down to the kind of creative used: text, articles, photos or videos.
You will need to consider all these to get successful on social media network(s) to ensure you don’t put efforts in the wrong direction.
Also, make use of social media management and monitoring tools to see how you are performing and gain insight into which area(s) you need to improve.
In Conclusion
When it comes to choosing the right place to start your business online you need to focus on the most important especially when you’re just starting.
With lots of tools and opportunities available online, it is easy to spin your wheel and lose focus. So it is best to carefully think through what was shared earlier to get you successful as you start your online business.
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