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How to Create a Powerful Business Presence in a Saturated World
No matter how great your services or products are, if your small business isn’t visible, you’ll struggle to connect with your target audience. The ability to stand out in an increasingly crowded marketplace is critical to gaining traction and success. Whether you are an entrepreneur just starting a business or an already established one—visibility should be your top priority.
Fortunately, there are many effective solutions business owners can use to create a robust presence that resonates with their consumers. To rise above the rest, try one of these strategies to build a highly visible business with the power to communicate, connect and convert.
Define Your Business with Brand Strategy
Creating a brand strategy when growing a business is an excellent way to communicate across numerous touchpoints why your business is unique and why consumers should trust you. Ultimately, trust fuels authority and credibility, enhancing your business’s value and visibility, which leads to high ROI rates and increased profits.
A crucial part of brand strategy is developing a Unique Value Proposition (UVP) for your small business. Through this process, you differentiate yourself from your competitors and hone in on your strengths. Defining what you bring to the table and what needs you meet for your customers is a powerful way to build valuable business assets such as trust, repeat purchases, and recognition.
Develop a Professional Website
Developing a professional website is an excellent way to cultivate your online presence. Websites are your online business card and serve many purposes besides being a helpful communication tool. A website is a platform to promote your business, create and build authority, and generate traffic, leads, and sales.
Website development has come a long way since the early days of the Internet. If you are overwhelmed by the thought of adding another project to your plate, there are many innovative website design tools that can simplify the process and save you time, money, and frustration. If you have limited skills and a limited budget, here are some excellent recommendations to get you started.
Position Your Small Business as an Authority
Your expertise and knowledge are valuable assets that anchor you within your community, in your industry, and with your followers. Any organization, whether you are a sole proprietor, a micro business, or a small business, benefits significantly from being seen as an expert in their niche.
Actionable ways to build authority are to create and share expertise. The easiest way to start is to write industry guides and how-tos; consider starting a blog or guest-writing blogs for established peers. More time-consuming but valuable are to plan in-house workshops or seminars to showcase your knowledge.
Connect with Your Customers
The primary goal of most businesses is to make a profit. To make this happen, you need customers, so your goal is to create happy customers. Knowing this makes your customers the ultimate asset for your business. You need to reach out and engage with them—not just because they made a purchase—but to show you care.
There are many ways to connect with your target audience, and one excellent way to begin is to have direct conversations with your customers about their experiences with you. When you know their likes, wants, and dislikes, you can better tailor their journey with you, and you create a connection that shows that you care.
Growing a Business with Social Media
Social media provides small businesses with many options to build awareness, authority, and trust. Most social media sites are free and, with minimal effort, can be an excellent way to remain relevant in a crowded marketplace. You can engage with your current audience and create a buzz for future clients.
You can post on different social media sites to meet various goals. FB is great for building awareness and sharing informative or entertaining information. LinkedIn doesn’t see itself as a social media site, but it is an excellent way to nurture your professional image and network with peers. Instagram is a great way to get noticed with little input; many businesses and brands make a big impression by posting creative images with minimal content.
Make Time for Networking
Networking is essential; it’s an excellent way to put your business on the map to establish yourself professionally online and in your community. Engaging with other entrepreneurs creates lasting relationships that help your business grow and spark creative thinking and collaboration. Showing up for local events and lending a hand demonstrates your commitment to the community. Expressing your interest in your peers and community is a fantastic way to build meaningful connections that can benefit your business in the long run.
Be Transparent with Your Business
The adage that honesty is the best policy is even more important in an era where businesses and consumers have complete access to each other through websites and social media. There’s no doubt that this instant access has some fantastic benefits: however, it puts additional responsibility on all parties, especially when things go wrong, and when they do, customers want transparency.
What is transparency in business? It’s all about trust and honesty. Not only is it important when things aren’t right, but customers also want to understand what an organization is doing to make the world a better place now. Do they support diversity in hiring? Are they using sustainable practices? Is their advertising supporting diversity?
Embrace a Forward Thinking Philosophy
One area of focus that deserves attention is embracing a future-focused mindset. When you have the foresight to research new technologies, business processes, products, services, and marketing opportunities, you can get a leg up on the competition. Developing new strategies to differentiate your business can immediately boost your visibility, consumer retention, and sales.
Change can be challenging for you and your customers, but being innovative and able to pivot as the world changes has advantages and benefits. For inspiration, read these case studies of businesses that weathered the Covid 19 pandemic because they regrouped during this challenging time.
So, Where To Start?
These are just a few activities you can do to increase your business’s visibility. You may be overwhelmed by all the options. Where do you begin? An excellent approach is to access what resources (including your time) you have at your disposal and then develop a manageable plan. Start with what you can handle and make progress towards being front and center in your consumers’ minds.
It may also benefit you to look at other articles in the NASE blog, Self Made. Our site shares valuable information with small business owners about current trends, relevant topics, and helpful advice from individuals who are in your shoes.