As a business, we know growth is one of your main priorities. In our SME research*, UK businesses told us that their main areas of focus for the next 12 months are growing their business (46%) and expanding their customer base (39%) .
What truly sets a great business apart from a good one is its ability to navigate growth obstacles and invest in the right areas. Read on as we share insight from our research on what businesses like yours are investing in.
Our research found there to be four categories of business investment being prioritised at the moment: online presence, staff training, new equipment and new technology.
Over the series of three blogs, we’ll take a look at each of these areas in more details, starting with developing your reach online.
Growing the online profile of a business was identified by 32% as a planned area of investment. This includes digital marketing practices and any means of digitally promoting a brand online. Here are some ideas of where you can make a difference…
SEO means optimising your website to make sure that it ranks highly on a search engine (such as Google) results page. This means that you are more visible to your potential customers. When this is done correctly, it means you can attract ‘organic traffic’ to your website – visitors that come to your website from an unpaid source, so essentially free.
Rather than money, SEO requires a considerable time investment to be done effectively. Developing a website to have a high level of search optimisation means allowing it time to mature within search results. This tends to have a longer turnaround compared to more immediate forms of marketing but does give more sustainable results in the long-term.
If you have the resource to have an in-house digital marketer, this is something they should be focusing on. Alternatively, the work could be outsourced to an agency that can help. For more information, you can find more information from this starter guide by Google.
Like SEO, social media marketing usually revolves around organic methods. If your business isn’t on any social platforms – that’s the first thing to resolve! Then you can look into the different options for advertising.
Research is your friend here, if you have a good understanding of who your target audience is, you will know the kind of social platform they might view. From there, you can start sharing more information with them.
Although there are paid elements, many businesses choose to first experiment without paid social. This allows them to gauge their initial performance, for example if they are reaching the right audience, and if people are interacting with the posts, prior to intervention from paid advertising.
This article from the Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) gives some great tips on how to approach social media marketing on the various different platforms.
Once you’ve explored what you can achieve organically, paid advertising could be your next avenue. This allows businesses like yours to make a more immediate impact in the world of online marketing. It involves paying for a spot at the top of a user’s search results or social media feeds, while competing against other brands that are paying equally as high amounts.
In addition to the organic traffic mentioned above, this can be a really effective way of catching the eye of potential customers.
To get started, here are some tips for SMEs from Forbes.
Aldermore is backing businesses. Whether it’s saving for investment opportunities, or funding your big plans, we can help. Explore our business savings accounts and our business finance options now.
*Source: Research conducted by Opinium on behalf of Aldermore between 16 – 29 April 2024 of 1,000 SME Senior Decision Makers.
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