If there’s one thing that you cannot deny about the modern world, it’s the internet has essentially taken over. We live in a digital world and it’s now just the duty of all of us in it to learn to adapt to that fact.
There are plenty of people who would say that this is a bad thing and plenty of others who would sing the digital world’s praises, but no matter how you feel about it, it’s something that we all have to come face to face with.
This is especially true if you’re running any kind of business. The reality of running a business is that you’ve got to be able to move with the times and embrace change. However, there are plenty of business that try and plug their ears to the future and ignore it which ends up with them getting left in the dust.
That being said, even if your business is willing to embrace the changes that come with the rise of the internet, that doesn’t mean that you’re guaranteed to succeed. One of the most important things when running a business online is being able to connect with your customers.
And if you can’t connect with your customers online then that’s a serious problem. With that in mind, here are just a few reasons that you might not be connecting with your customers on the internet the way you would like to.
1] They can’t find you
One of the things that a lot of businesses find themselves stumbling over when they make the shift towards a larger online presence, is that they relationship between customer and business shifts in some pretty unexpected ways.
When you’re marketing your business in a traditional way, it’s about trying to make sure that customers can see you. It’s about reaching out to customers and doing the work to find them. However, when your business is online, all of that sort of changes. Instead of your business going to find customers, it’s a matter of making sure that your customers can find you as easily as possible.
After all, if someone wants to find a certain product or service, the first thing that they do is search for it on a site like Google. You need to be sure that your business is the first thing that they see.
This is called Search Engine Optimization or SEO and it’s a whole lot more complicated than you might think. It’s often a good idea to connect with a professional SEO agency if you really want to make the most of it.
2] Your website is terrible
Of course, it’s not going to make a difference how easy your business is to find online if the first thing that people see puts them off immediately. The truth is that one of the major problems that you may be having when it comes to your business’s online presence is that your website is simply awful.
It might sound a little shallow to say but most people don’t have the time to look really closely at something online before making a decision. Because of that they go off first impressions and if your website looks amateurish then people are going to assume that your entire business is amateurish.
Web design is a complicated and difficult thing and it’s not generally something that you can deal with entirely on your own. Working alongside a professional is often the best thing to do if you want to create a website your customers will want to visit.
3] You’re not embracing social media
Even those who are aware that their business will benefit from being online have a habit of assuming that social media isn’t something they need to worry about. They assume that it’s little more than a fad but the truth is that Facebook and Twitter have both been around for more than a decade and they’re not going anywhere.
More and more people are staying within their own social media circles rather than branching out into different parts of the internet. That means that if you don’t have some kind of social media presence, you’re as good as invisible to a lot of potential customers.
Not only that but social media offers you the chance to connect directly with individual customers on a scale that has never really been possible before. You can make each customer feel truly connected to your business.
How to Start a Business Online In Africa?4] You don’t understand the language
One of the most common mistakes that a lot of businesses make when they start engaging with potential customers online is that they don’t understand the language of the internet. You can’t just throw advertising at customers and assume that it will be effective because it’s on the internet.
The truth is that people online don’t want advertising. When ads show up they click away almost instantly. What they want is content. Being able to give them interesting, entertaining, and engaging content is one of the most important ways to really connect with customers and to make them feel really connected to your business.
Of course, it’s not all about changing your business in order to connect with customers online. A lot of the time it’s actually a matter of being able to transfer the things that you have always been successfully doing onto the internet.
Things like making your customers feel valued, doing your research to ensure that you know exactly who your demographic is, and being able to create marketing that is tailored to their preferences are all things that are just as relevant as they’ve always been.
The difference is just that you’re using those techniques and ideas in a new place that has a different language of its own, different techniques to make the most of it, and different priorities that you need to be aware of.
Remember, it’s not about changing your business entirely to fit the modern world, it’s about being able to adapt to the world around you while still keeping your business intact.
