When you first start up a business, setting up your online footprint should generally be something you do as quickly as possible. In the modern world, a company without a website and social media presence is at a huge disadvantage when compared to your competitors. From e-commerce based companies to local bakeries, everyone is getting in on the act these days, so for those of you who feel slightly daunted by the thought of placing your digital flags in the sand, we have a few pointers to help you on your way.
Yes, You Still Need a Website
Many of you may be thinking that with the huge array of social media sites, you don’t need your own website anymore. You couldn’t be more wrong. Having your own website will push your brand up search engine rankings, and will also make your business look more professional. From your website, it is still a very good idea to link back to social media accounts, such as Facebook and Twitter, but even having a landing page, purely to push your customers towards other sites (such as your social media, or products on Amazon) is highly advisable.
To get started you need a couple of things. A web hosting platform, and a URL. Some web hosting platforms can supply both for you, or if you prefer keeping them separate, plenty of companies just deal with each individually. Depending on your level of expertise, you can either build a website from scratch, or for those who would rather spend more time on the content than the coding, many companies provide very simple ‘drag and drop’ template style web creation tools. The likes of Squarespace and Wix are great examples of this, and are especially useful for the novices out there, although you will pay a premium for these sorts of services.
A cheaper way to build your site is to get your domain bought separately, and use free website builders such as WordPress. WordPress is extremely popular, in fact it hosts over 74.6 million sites worldwide according to Manage WordPress. Since its release it has also become infinitely easier to use, and no longer requires you to be an internet guru to get started. They have taken a leaf out of Squarespace and Wix’s book, and made the whole process simple and easy to produce gorgeous websites with very little effort.
Before getting started on WordPress, it is a good idea to get your URL domain name sorted out first. There are various domain hosting providers that will allow you to buy whatever domain name you like the sound of, and see if it is still available, and host it on WordPress for a fraction of the price you would have to pay some of the flashier hosts mentioned above. When you have found a name you like (generally one that is aligned to your business) it is a good idea to buy not only that web address, but similar ones too.
For example if your business is called The Young Funky Kitchen, you may want to buy youngfunkykitchen.com, as well as YFK.com, and funkykitchen.com. The .com suffix isn’t your only option either. While everyone was scrambling to grab the .com variants 5 year ago, it is perfectly fine to align your website with a country-centric ending such as a .uk domain name suffix for the United Kingdom, or if you happen to be an internet TV station, why not got for .tv? Some companies even buy up their company names with spelling mistakes too, making it even easier for their customers to find their brand regardless of how sloppy they are at typing. Ever typed Facbook instead of Facebook? If you do, you will still end up at the same website.
Your company and website name are hugely important, so make sure to take the time and get a name that is catchy and most importantly, available! The ability to make sure your brand aligns with your web presence is so important, many people now buy their web domains before they even register their business name.
Be Seriously Social
Once you have your website sorted, it is time to get social. Depending on your target audience, there is a plethora of social media sites and apps available to you that can help drive traffic and in turn, sales. Facebook should always be a port of call, seeing as it is the biggest social media site in the world. Twitter and Instagram are also great sites for pushing products, and talking to your customers. Even if you don’t use Twitter or Instagram often, it is always a good idea to set up an account, even if it is just a preemptive strike against anyone else who might sign up with your company name, and try to leverage money out of you in a social media ‘heist’. While this is unlikely to happen when you first start out, if you become successful, there will be plenty of nefarious types that will look at you as a giant cheque book, so it always pays to be pro-active (just ask Microsoft and Google, who both fell short in this test a few years back when they let their domain payments slip, and 2 people took over the domains).
Having these social accounts dormant while you run your business will at least give you the peace of mind that nobody is signing up online and pretending to be you, but it won’t drive much traffic. For that, you need to get involved and start talking to your followers. Study your competitors and note what they do well. Never try to copy them, but feel free to take pointers from your foes. Borrow what you do like, ignore what you don’t, and start building your own style that suits your brand.
Building Your Web Presence
This is not a reference to building your own world wide web, but more like your ‘brand web’. By this, we mean you should link your social accounts to your website, and vice-versa. From your Instagram page a customer should be able to reach your website without typing your URL. There is usually somewhere to put a website URL in a profile, no matter what social network you are using, and this should be the case for your Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts. It also pays to link to other sites, such as affiliates. If you have companies you work with and can recommend (not rivals, obviously), it can be a great way to drive new traffic by having links on both companies websites, linking to each other. Not only does this allow customers to cross-over between sites, but it can also push you higher up Google rankings. The higher you are on the rankings, the more likely customers are to find you when they search for a solution to their problem. If you don’t think Google rankings are important, it may be worth taking a look at the stats. If you aren’t on the first page of a Google search for your business name, you aren’t anywhere.
So there you have it, a few tips for setting up your initial digital footprint. While it is not an exact science when it comes to successfully promoting your brand online, there are definitely ways to increase the likelihood of success. In a nutshell, get yourself a domain, build your site, and get social. It may sound daunting to the novice, but by the time you have implemented the advice above, you won’t be a novice for long!
