The Whole Point – Know
What’s the whole point of marketing your business or nonprofit online? Too often, we can get bogged down with new tools, features, and changing capabilities. We lose track of what it’s really all about when we get caught up in the details.
Really, the point of marketing online is pretty simple. And if you can keep it in mind, it makes decisions about online marketing a lot easier.
You may have heard the saying, “People do business with those they know, like, and trust.” And if we add in one additional component, it gives us the whole point. Online marketing is about getting people to…
- Know
- Like
- Trust
- Value
… you and your organization. Once you do that, people are primed to take whatever action you want them to, whether that’s doing business, or just spreading the word.
We add value to the list because people have to be in the market for what you’re selling. Even if someone knows, likes, and trusts you, they may simply not make the decision about your service at their organization. In that case, what you do has no value for them directly.
So how can we show these with online marketing? Over my next few blog entries, we’ll look at each goal and talk about a few ways we can accomplish it.
First, you get people to Know you online when you Show Up. You have to actually be present on social media, have a website with a blog, or have an email newsletter.
Does that mean you need to sign up for every social network that pops up? Obviously not. Nobody has time for that.
Some of the people online may actually know you in real life. But you want people that don’t know you in real life as well. And in order to get those people connecting with you, you have to be there for them to connect with.
On many of the social media networks, this means you should have a presence both as a business, and as an individual. And that means different things on different platforms. On most of the prevalent ones, it means you need both a personal profile and a business page. On some, it means you need an account for personal use and an account for business use.