The most satisfying calendar month of Digidol’s lifetime (if you know, you know) has come to an end and the great start to 2021 has continued.
This month has been very busy building the digital presence of several of our existing clients including Chris Evans Plumbing and Heating, UP Coaching and The Westwood Park Hotel. In addition to launching a new website for our new client Nomadic Washrooms which has received incredibly positive feedback.
There are also two more new websites that are near completion and we are looking forward to sharing these with you during March! Finally, we have also acquired a new client who we are excited to start working with to transform their amazing ideas into reality.
Another positive is that our weekly Digidol tips have also received more and more interaction each week, which is not only helping develop leads but also build our social media audience. As always, if you have any questions about our tips or the digital presence of your small business then please feel free to take advantage of our FREE 1-Hour Consultation, simply send us a message to get started!
Ask The Audience – Weekly Tip #005
Coming up with new ideas for engaging content can be difficult (believe us we have been there). But sometimes the answers can be right in front of you. The reason that people follow you is because they love your product or service, so ask them what they want to see on your socials. It really can be as simple as that.
We are not saying that you should create a 10-page questionnaire and send it to your followers, as your return rate will be awful and you will have far too much data to sort through. Instead, utilise the tools given to you by social media networks. Facebook and Instagram now have ‘Question’ features available when posting on your story, they also have ‘Polls’ where you can get followers to vote. These are quick to create and can give you amazing content ideas or find out what your followers love with minimal effort.
You can also use these features to host interactive question and answer sessions with your followers. By giving them the power to write their own questions to you to find out more about you and your business. This is a great way to help strengthen the relationship between you and your followers!
A great local example of this is @clairisaac.art who used the question feature on her Instagram story in order to get new ideas for content to post on her social media. Her followers flooded her with replies which included great feedback on the existing content she posted as well as new content ideas. She found that her followers loved seeing time-lapse videos of her paintings and that they wanted to see more. Another repeated suggestion from her followers was tips on how to paint for beginners so they could have a go themselves. Clair is now planning a new social media campaign with easy to follow painting tips and creating more time-lapse videos for when she’s painting new pieces.
Actionable Tips
Pop The Question – Give it a go, it is quick and easy to set-up and your next great content idea could be out there. Ask generic questions like ‘What type of posts do you want to see?’ or host a Q&A session where people can ask anything about your small business.
GOOGLE MY BUSINESS – Weekly Tip #006
To be honest, I am surprised that we have got to tip number six without mentioning Google My Business. This is one of the first things I look for when I complete a free 1-hour consultation for small businesses, as it usually gives a good indication of how much work has been put into their digital presence. If you have a Google My Business account then well done – your reward is to skip down to the second actionable tip at the bottom of this post! If not, take a moment to read how Google My Business can help you!
The basic reasoning behind Google My Business is to provide small local businesses with a chance to compete with national businesses in search engine result pages. Setting up a Google My Business account is really simple and can allow you to feature at the top of search results pages without having to spend a penny. Most people underestimate the value of a Google My Business account, thinking it is only there to show basic company information such as opening times. But it is actually a great place to collect reviews, and as we mentioned, an extra chance to come up on search results via the map.
Setting up a Google My Business account is as easy as going to the Google MyBusiness homepage and registering the information about your business. After this Google will send a postcard to your address which includes a passcode that you input to activate your account – and that’s it. You can now turn up on the Google map when people search for keywords that relate to your business.
Actionable Tip
X-Marks The Spot – Set up a Google My Business listing and get ranking locally for keywords relevant for your business. Getting on the map will increase the visibility of your business for generic searches in your area by tenfold, so make sure you’re there to be seen!
Spring Cleaning – If you already have a Google My Business account, check it and make sure it is updated with all of the latest information. In addition, add a post with a project you have recently completed, or a good news story from your business. Finally, get some reviews in, the more good reviews you get the higher you go on the list. Google provide an easy-to-use link that you can send to clients and customers in order to get them to write a review.
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Spruce Up Your Profiles – Weekly Tip #007
In the excitement of setting up a new business, you create all of your social media platforms filling in a hundred different ‘Bios’, ‘About Us’ and ‘Our Story’ sections – but (without looking) do you even remember what they say? In between setting up your business social media and now so much about your business may have changed – so make sure that your social media profiles reflect that.
Take a step back and go through your social media platforms as if you were a complete stranger coming into contact with your business for the first time. What’s in there that shouldn’t be in there? Or more importantly, what’s not in there that should be? You may have products that no longer exist or you may now offer a hugely popular service that was only a glint in your eye when you set up your social media platforms.
Another option is to create a Link Tree like or Tap Link, like we have at Digidol Link and Digidol Tap Link. This allows you to provide users with a quick an easy navigation to the website page they want from your socials.
Below are a few different questions to ask yourself when reviewing your business’ social media profiles:
Is there a link to your website?
Is it the right email address?
Is all the information correct?
Have you recently updated your profile or cover photo?
Are all of your unique selling points on show?
Have you won any awards you want to show off?
Actionable Tip
Have a Bruce SpringClean – Make sure your businesses social media profiles are not ‘dancing in the dark’ ages and are up to date with the latest information. Check all the links to make sure they are working and ensure that all of your unique selling points are on show. Finally, if your business wasn’t ‘Born In The USA’, don’t say it was (I’m sorry, I just couldn’t miss that open goal).
Utilise Templates – Weekly Tip #008
One of the most common misconceptions when it comes to marketing is that everything needs to be unique and created by you. If this was the case, then everyone would spend infinite hours creating social media posts in order to compete. Please don’t be afraid to utilise templates. At the end of the day, most templates are made by professional graphic designers – so why should you waste hours attempting to outdo a professional?
Canva is an online graphic design platform that does pretty much all of the work for you. When creating a graphic on Canva, you can even choose which social media platform the graphic is intended for and they will give you the correct sizings for you – and that is just the start. Canva has a huge bank of templates that you can use for free in order to make amazing graphics quickly. All you need to do is change the colours to your branding, replace the content with your own and then add your logo.
If you want to be adventurous and have a go at making graphics yourself you can use their elements section to add cool aspects to your designs. Some of these are off-limits as they are included in Canva’s premium option which costs £10.99 a month (they’ve got to make money somehow).
However, if you are only wanting to create a small number of graphics for your small businesses social media platforms then the free version is more than enough. All of the graphics at Digidol are made using Canva. We don’t use public templates, but after making several of our own templates that contain Digidol’s branding, we can now make new graphics (such as these weekly digital marketing tips) quickly and easily.
Actionable Tip
A Blank Canva – Make a free account and give Canva or another free graphic design program a go! You will surprise yourself with how easy it is to make beautiful graphics that include your branding in minutes.
Monthly Summary
- Ask The Audience – Find out what posts your audience want you to create- don’t leave it to chance.
- Google My Business – As far as we are concerned every small business and dole trader should have a Google My Business account. You can rank on SERP’s for free for minimal work, what’s not to love?
- Spring Clean Your Socials – Check your businesses social media profiles to make sure they are up to date and represent your business as it exists now.
- Utilise Templates – There are thousands of great templates you can use (and add your own branding to) in order to quickly create amazing social media posts.
If you are interested in finding out more about the digital presence of your small business and how it can be improved, get in touch with us at Digidol for a FREE 1-Hour Consultation!
