As many of you contemplate your plans for 2012, it's likely that you'll consider an expanded (or least revised) online marketing plan for the new year. It just makes simple economic sense: In a tough economy, what better way to grow your business than by employing high return on investment strategies to find new customers? And where can you find new buyers more cost-effectively than the Internet?
Since a lot of you have probably already reached the same conclusions on your own, let us help you take the thought process a little bit further. Here are four things that should be a part of your 2012 online marketing plan:
Search engine optimization. Although this may already be a big part of your business, don't take your foot off the gas now. Competition for the top spots on Google, Yahoo, and Bing is only increasing, as are the rewards. Accounting for some 3 billion searches a day between them, the major search engines are still your biggest source of online traffic and revenue, if only you're ready to take advantage of them.
Blogging. Starting and running a company blog seems to have fallen out of favor a little bit in the past two years. Not because it doesn't work, but because it isn't as easy as a lot of business owners and executives imagined it would be. Make 2012 the year that your blog becomes a valuable resource, both for your clients and your online profitability.
Social media. Most companies, large or small, have already come around to the fact that they can't ignore the hundreds of millions of potential customers to be found on sites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. But most aren't updating their profiles and responding to requests consistently enough, and are also failing to take advantage of new advertising opportunities like sponsored tweets and Facebook PPC ads. Depending on your industry and products, these could be very high-profit avenues, so don't let them get away in 2012.
Online videos. YouTube is showing billions of videos each and every day, and customers are learning to look there for advice, customer service, buying recommendations, and other important decisions. Make sure that your videos are well produced and featured on sites like YouTube, your company website, and even your social profiles in the coming months.
Of course, keeping on top of any one of these – much less all four of them – could easily keep a full-time employee busy. Why not work with cayk – one of Canada's fastest-growing online marketing teams – to make sure you're getting the quality and results you need?
