If you’re familiar with the book (and blog) The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin, the title of this blog post series might sound familiar. In the book, Rubin works on improving a different part of her life one month at a time and offers suggestions on how to do it yourself at the end.
The Happiness Project is the inspiration for this 4-part blog post series. Because it is so much easier to reach your goals in small, doable steps, I broke down the elements of what goes into a comprehensive online marketing strategy. I don’t know if it will make you happier, but my plan will certainly make online marketing easier to put your arms around. Let’s get started!
Step 1: Audit Your Website
Because the foundation of your online presence is your website, that’s where we’re starting:
- Look at your Google Analytics data – What keywords are you being found for? Where is your traffic coming from? What pages are visitors spending time on?
- Update your website – Add new information and remove anything that is outdated. Bulk up the pages visitors spend the most time on and remove any that get no traffic.
- Proof your website – Check that all links work, spelling and grammar are correct, and the keywords you are being found for are being used throughout the site.
- Optimize your website – Work with a search engine optimization expert (ask your web developer for recommendations) to ensure your site is properly optimized. Set up a maintenance schedule with the SEO person to make sure your site keeps up with changes in technology and search engine algorithms.
Step 2: Build a Mobile Site
Thanks to the increasing use of mobile devices to access and shop on the Internet, now is the time to put together a great mobile site:
- Prioritize content – Because mobile sites have smaller screens, you want to add only the content that is most relevant to a mobile user, like hours of operation, location (with a map!), a brief overview of products and services, and contact info.
- Streamline navigation – To cut down on scrolling or tapping, make sure the developer keeps navigation super simple.
- Make contact info actionable – If you add an email address or phone number, a user should be able to tap on it and instantly connect with their email or phone functions.
Step 3: Start Listening
Now that your website and mobile sites are in good shape, time to find out what your customers and target market care about:
- Set up Google Alerts – Find out what people are saying about your business, industry, products, and services by setting up Google Alerts using relevant keywords.
- Follow trends on Twitter – If you are active on Twitter, trending topics are automatically customized for you based on who you follow. You can find them in the left-hand column.
- Ask your customers – Sometimes the most obvious solution is the simplest. Ask your customers what they care about on Facebook or with a survey. To increase the amount of feedback you get, offer a freebie.
In my next post, we’ll look at editorial calendars, social media, and blogging, but til then, what aspect of marketing do you most want to improve?
Image by Flickr user fra-NCIS (Creative Commons)
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