To run a successful business of any size these days, even if your business is purely brick-and-mortar, you need to manage your online reputation. This covers a lot of things, starting with building brand awareness of your products and services. While reputation management was once a task for corporate human resources departments, the Internet has changed that definition forever.

People often communicate about their happiness, from a cappuccino in the morning to a nightcap at the end of the day. These posts and conversations begin to build your reputation... Especially if you haven't made any other efforts to increase public trust in your brand.

What exactly is your online presence and reputation? Why is it so important? Your brand image is determined by the sum of information on the Internet that is relevant to you personally and as a company.

Interested consumers can use company websites and blogs, social media posts and public interactions. Careful content creation, expertise, and top-notch customer service are among the ways you can build a positive reputation and earn consumer trust.

You must develop a systematic plan to build and maintain your reputation.

When you link your blog to your website (which most experts recommend), you provide valuable information to your visitors.

You can use a variety of media to convey your message, including embedding videos into your pages. The content must be relevant to your niche and portray you as a credible authority in the field.

Although social media sites should not be the focus of your internet communications, they can help you gain the public's trust and attention. The majority of your sharing should be dedicated to promoting other people’s content.

Direct promotion of your products and services should be no more than a quarter.

This strategy will build trust with others because you are supporting the industry as a whole and not just focusing on self-promotion. Additionally, you'll build a reputation among your colleagues as a trustworthy company, which can lead to new opportunities or partnerships.

Other ways to increase your online reputation is to join groups and forums related to your company. However, don’t focus on promoting your business. Bring relevant insights into the conversation when necessary. If you don't understand something, ask polite questions. You and your company deserve a strong online branding.

Many online communities allow users to post company and blog URLs in their signatures. That's all you should do to promote your forum.

You may also consider hiring a reputation management team if you or your company have a poor online presence. These companies use various tactics to reduce attention to negative content and promote positive search results for your business.

Use a cloud based tool for Hotel And Restaurant operators, for example, that engages with recent customers via email or SMS and invites them to give feedback on their recent experience of your business. There are so many tools to engage with your customers! Use them! Act whisely.

Building trust among the public is critical to a company's success. These methods will help you build an attractive online reputation for your business and provide a solid foundation for both you and the business.

Digitalization means that your business assets are moving to a digital business. This change can be done entirely and it means you will have a digital business. Or, you can keep your business as it is and develop a new part of your business, the digital part. 

Whether your case, consider how to spend your money for business digitalization.

By using advanced digital technologies, you should see fundamental changes in your business processes that can result in new business models, social change, customers behavior modifications. With your digital platform, your products and services can be available for your clients.

Digitazion is the conversion of text, pictures, or sound into a digital form that can be processed by a computer. In this context, computer is more than a desktop or laptop. It is any device that can convert and deliver data to the user, such mobile phones, smartTVs, smart screens.

Is a website considered a digital asset?

Your website can be your digital asset. A digital asset is anything that is stored digitally, uniquely identifiable that your business can use to give value. Examples of digital assets include documents, audio, videos, logos, slide presentations, spreadsheets, apps, websites.

Question: Can anything be done to reduce the advertising cost? Or to increase the efficiency of further promotion with your money?

Yes, it is possible.

There are two important things that can be done to significantly help the promotion of the site:

1. It is possible to increase the chance that someone who enters the website will become a customer. It's called increasing the conversion rate.

2. The website can be optimized to receive unpaid traffic from Google. It's called search engine optimization, SEO. Read the guide we written on how to SEO for European online stores.

How are they made? And what are the costs? Find out further.

Website

How to build an effective website with your funds

The general strategy of an effective site that sells well

The first point is the site must sell well. That is, to have a high conversion rate. When someone enters your website, there is a great chance to buy or ask for an offer.

The second point is to have as much unpaid traffic as possible (not from paid promotion campaigns), mainly with optimization for Google and other search engines, or SEO.

How to increase the chance that your website will sell - high conversion rate

We receive many requests to the agency from people who want websites for their businesses. One of the most frequently encountered requirements is that the site should be "simple and easy to use". The simpler, the better.

It seems like a reasonable request, right?

It's like saying: "he wants a salesrep... but let him be quiet, not to disturb anyone". Do you think a silent salesperson will sell?

Nowadays you can find goods and services everywhere. One have to have money, because buying can be done in multiple places.

The biggest problem in sales is to convince people to buy from you, not from the competition. When the visitor enters your website, it's your chance to convince them that what you offer is better than what others offer.

Do you think that a very simple website, without information, without anything really special, will convince someone that your products are the best?

Very likely not. Very likely the visitor will enter your website, will stay for five seconds in which they do not see anything interesting, after which they usually goes and buys where he knows and where he has probably bought before.

Fewer people would buy from unknown small companies when there are so many offers from big companies.

❗️ The reality is that a simplistic website, without information and without anything special, DOES NOT SELL.



What can be done?

In a nutshell, there are 2 things you need to build in your website to sell better or to have a higher conversion rate:

- You should have as many different offers as possible, for as many people as possible.

- You should increase the authority of your website. That is, the site should present trust.

Website authority

If you want to sell to more people, you must have as diverse an offer as possible. In general, people are not looking for general things. People are looking for specific things.

No one is looking for "clothes" or "appliances". People search for "men's black slim fit shirt" or "microwave oven with grill".

In order to sell, you have to offer- as much as possible- to each visitor exactly what they need.

Many studies have been done, and each time the result is the same. The conversion rate is directly correlated with the number of products and offers in the website.

The more your website offer more products and services, the greater the chance that the visitor will find exactly what they need in your website.

Recommendations to adapt your website with more categories

For example, if you have a store, make many more categories. Don't just make one "shirt" category. Make categories for shirts according to colors, according to sizes, according to material, and so on.

The more categories you have on the site, the easier it is for the visitor to go where they know they want to go.

Provide as many details as possible about your products and services. How many times have you wanted to buy something, but you didn't because there wasn't enough information about the product? For example, food products that do not mention the ingredients, clothes with little relevant pictures from which you do not understand exactly what the material is like, furniture or decorative objects where the size is not clearly specified.

In short, the more information you have on the site, the better you will sell.

When you want to sell more, you have to prove that you are trustworthy

In essence, a customer is a person who gives you money for something. How do you convince the person in question that you don't disappear into the night with his money or that the service offered is offered within the parameters presented?

In other words, how do you convince people to trust you?

You can gain trust mainly in two ways:

1. You present the service or the product in detail and with these details you show confidence because you prove that you are an expert in the niche in which you operate.

For example, you have a car service.

You can say "Come to us for service and we will fix your car"

Or,

"Come to us for service. We always have someone at the reception. they find out what problem you have and assign you to the right mechanic. If the problem is small, you can wait comfortably. The coffee is from us.

We sign a car pick-up form.

Afterwards, the car is taken to service and put on the tester for diagnosis.

The client is presented with the result of the diagnosis and the costs for the repair. The client decides which of the problems are to be solved.

Depending on the customer's decision, the estimated repair time is sent."

In which of the two situations above does the company seem more professional?

If you had to choose, in which of the two situations is the probability of receiving quality services higher?

2. To gain trust, present as many projects as possible that were completed by you. Preferably for other known entities.

You present confidence because you show that you are able to complete or deliver large and complex works, even more so if you do something for large entities.

An important aspect of confidence is that it is quite difficult to grow it yourself. "Self-praise does not smell good"

Trust is much easier to gain by associating with other partners who show trust.

Another important aspect is that the more detailed the story, the greater the effect.

It's one thing to say that "XYZ" is among our clients, and it's quite another to make a page dedicated to the project carried out for XYZ. On the respective page, put pictures from the work, one or two interviews with someone from XYZ company, details from the realization phase, how long it took, some technical specifications of the project, and so on. If possible, make a video. It is even better.

Such a project page is one of the strongest proofs that your company can do something all right and that you show confidence.


What are the approximate costs of increasing authority and conversion to a website

As always, the costs are directly proportional to the work done. If you want something to come out really good, then someone has to work for that something to be good.

Increasing relevance is directly related to the number of products and services offered by your company.

If it is a smaller store or a company that offers services, we are talking about 10-30 pages of categories and/or services.

The approximate cost could be somewhere around 5,000 - 15,000 $ and a number of hours somewhere around 50 and 150 hours.

We repeat, the degree of approximation is very high. In reality, the size of the project is discussed from case to case and from budget to budget. For a more accurate cost, we have a dedicated price calculator - website creation cost estimation calculator.

How to increase website traffic with SEO

Traffic is the other essential aspect for a website. What is traffic to a website? Website traffic refers to web users who visit a website. Web traffic is measured in visits, sometimes called "sessions," and is a common way to measure an online business effectiveness at attracting an audience.

No matter how well made the website is, if it has no visitors, nothing happens.

The premise from which we started, however, is that we are not allowed to rely on paid advertising.

In this case, the main source we can rely on is the natural, unpaid traffic from Google. We mean SEO.


What does optimization for Google mean
For SEO, there are two large categories of optimizations that are done:

1. Site-level optimization (in-site)

2. External promotion or off-site optimization

Point number 2, for the most part, also involves budgets. Thus, according to the scenario we were working with, we can hardly rely on links or external promotion at all. We don't have a promotion budget.

So, what we can do is to optimize the site very well.

What exactly does on-site SEO mean?

What is sitewide optimization

When looking for a product or service they want, people generally search specifically, not generally.

If you want a white kitchen on the corner, then you will not look for "furniture" but you will look for "white kitchen furniture on the corner"

To whom the visitor who is looking for such a thing, will reach? To the one that is on the first page.

Who does Google put on the first page?
Those sites that have very relevant pages for the "white corner kitchen furniture" search.

If you have a generic page with "kitchen furniture" then you will most likely not be on the first page.

An important aspect: Google undestand that your "kitchen furniture" page is relevant to what that person is looking for. However, the first page in Google is not about whether you are relevant or not. On the first page are those who are most relevant in users location for that search.

For successful SEO it is not enough for Google to understand what you have on your site. Google must consider you are one of the ten most valuable on the Internet for that search.

And to be valuable for Google, a page with three sentences and two pictures might not be enough.

To make a really good website from an SEO point of view, a plan is made with the following steps:

- a table is made with the keywords searched by people in Google
- based on this table, a requirement for the of number of pages is made. For each keyword, a separate page must be created in the website
- there are written relevant texts, pictures and what else is needed depending on the type of search
The main optimization criteria at the page level are presented in detail here.

We mention that a single well-made page requires somewhere around 3 to 10 hours of work. It can be even more, but this is where the vast majority of projects fall. So we are talking about a cost somewhere around 300 to 1000 $ per page.

Now, the number of pages and keywords is determined according to the nature of each individual business. We estimates, for a company that offers services, the number of searches is generally somewhere around 10-30, and for an online store, the number of searches is generally higher. If the store sells many products, from many categories, then we can talk about hundreds of pages. Just think how many searches are in the clothes field.

So, cumulatively, the on-site optimization of a website, if done well, can cost somewhere around 5,000 to 30,000 $.

The amounts are obviously approximate and we have taken into account projects of reasonably average sizes.

One more thing, the costs do not include promotion. The given scenario is that we are not allowed to have a promotion budget. In case you want a more accurate cost, including the one with promotion, we invite you to use our contact form.

Are you interested to attract visitors from Google for free?
Do you want to be on top positions and receive quality traffic?
Great. Make a YouTube channel. You need it.

It's not a joke. In a few moths, a BIG part of the first positions in Google will be YouTube videos. Without a YouTube channel, on certain searches, you won't have a chance for a position on the first page of Google. 

What is the recipe for success in online marketing?

Test -> Find the most effective ad -> Move your entire budget there -> Reap the benefits. Overall, this is good advice. It makes sense to maximize profits. The problem arises when something major and negative changes in the channel through which you promote yourself and was the only source of customers.

Risk diminution in online marketing - some methods

This year is a bit more atypical in terms of online promotion. Or at least that's how I perceived it. Two main promotion channels - Google and Facebook have fallen sharply in terms of efficiency.

Google has become very expensive - in general because the demand for ads has increased a lot - due to the migration of many budgets online.

Facebook has become more expensive and stupid - literally - because the algorithm has been changed due to legislative requirements imposed by the EU.

Specifically, the Facebook algorithm is not nearly as efficient in achieving its goals as you set it, which translates into a much higher cost. Google is just as effective, but it's much more expensive - that's about it. I know many businesses that relied almost exclusively on one of the two promotion channels and now have major problems looking for viable alternatives.

What exactly does risk management mean?
Risk reduction is one of the main occupations of any professional.

How do you reduce the risk?

Simple - through diversification. Don't put all your eggs in one basket. How does this translate into marketing? Don't spend most of your budget on the same promotion channel.

Basically, you can't control what Facebook, Google, Tik-Tok, one site or another do. BUT, you can diversify your promotion and not just use one promotion channel. 

Recommendations for the Diversification of Promotion Channels

Include in your promotion also channels in which the relationship between you and the potential client is very direct. How? Google, Facebook, Tik-Tok - are channels that are essentially intermediaries between you and the potential customer.

If all of a sudden your Facebook, Twitter, Tik-Tok, etc. account is banned / closed, you are actually left out. Most content is managed algorithmically. If the robot has something with you, it can suspend your account in a second.

What can you do?

You can invest in direct communication channels with your audience and diversify the channels. By far, the most robust communication channels are: Email and SMS.

Other complementary communication channels: Whatsapp - clearly it can fall and it's still Facebook. Or newer meta. Push Notifications

It is no longer in a single social network
No matter how good you are, diversify your profile and promotion.
Sign up for Facebook / Instagram, Linkedin, Tik-Tok and YouTube and Pinterest and more recently Spotify.

What if you only sell well in one network?

Nobody says you have to put in the effort. Is Linkedin working much better than the others? Perfect - allocate 80% of your budget / time there. You will not die if you allocate 20% of the budget to the rest of the networks.

BUT, if linkedin upsets you and the robot bans your account, or explodes the price or I don't know what regulation forbids advertising there, then you run the risk of having big problems if you don't have alternatives.

If it is small, it increases the share of the budget allocated to the site

Your social media account is NOT LEGAL YOURS. You are not the owner. They are.

The site is YOUR LEGAL. Legally your site is more robust than your social media account.

It is good to have as much online presence as possible based on your site. Your site is YOURS.

Invest time in partnerships with other companies that offer complementary services OR are also promoted to your audience

You reinvent the long-forgotten art of collaboration between companies. Define the profile of your client (Buyer Persona) and see what other companies have clients with a very similar profile

    Example: the company that organizes mountain camps collaborates with a ski and sporting goods store
    Example: the company that makes custom furniture collaborates with the company that paints

Invest time in building relationships with your best clients

"80% of the profit is brought by 20% of the customers" and "those who look alike gather"

Do you have some customers who are significantly better than average?

It is very possible that they have very similar friends with them - about the same preferences, about the same standard of living, etc.

Invest in getting closer to the top 20% of your customers and statistically the chance is high to bring you other similar friends.

And when I say investment, I don't mean money. A simple phone call in which to ask what he needs or how you can help him, without necessarily selling him something can be a significant differentiator.