Digital transformation does not apply for large enterprises only. Yes, you read it correct – Small businesses also need to or rather can have a strategy for digital transformation.
The first step towards digital transformation is to have a well designed and functional web presence/website. Today’s businesses must have websites which are easily found by visitors, highly optimized, provide meaningful content, better search ranking thereby converting visitors to consumers. Web presence leads to having a website which can be accessed on any device.
Consumers spend most of their time on mobile devices. According to Statista, in 2021, the number of mobile devices operating worldwide stood at almost 15 billion, up from just over 14 billion in the previous year. The number of mobile devices is expected to reach 18.22 billion by 2025, an increase of 4.2 billion devices compared to 2020 levels.
Mobile outreach strategy is the prime target for businesses of today. Many a times small business owners/startups contemplate whether to build a responsive website or a native app or even both. This contemplation may not be of worry for businesses with ample startup funding however it quickly becomes a discussion of what should be created first owing to cost and marketing strategy for small business owners who are just starting out with their venture.
So what is a responsive website?
As opposed to a strictly “mobile-website” such as m.domainname.com a responsive website allows websites to be viewed on various mobile devices and screen sizes. As the name implies responsive sites “respond” to the device they’re on shifting and scaling based on the device screen size.
Below are some tips that will help you take a practical approach towards your first step in digital transformation journey.
- If your goals are primarily related to creating a presence, initial marketing; a responsive website is always going to make sense as a practical first step in your mobile outreach strategy. You can be pragmatic and delay the creation of a native app until you have a solid presence and useful content.
- The average shelf life of an app on a device is usually less if the app is not solving a purpose or does not have useful or meaningful content. Building a native app early on in the venture could discourage potential users should they not find meaningful content/use. Building a responsive website will help you test the waters, build presence as you build content in parallel. Users can return to a website but to convince them to re-download the app if they lose interest would be challenging.
- Building a responsive website is time and cost-effective versus building a native app for different platforms in the beginning. The responsive website is readily available to consumers via the browser on any device.
- As you are starting your venture, the need to upgrade and push new content is frequent. The strategy to go with a responsive website early on will tremendously help you with maintenance and upgrade. Properly supporting and maintaining an app (upgrades, testing, compatibility issues and ongoing development) is much more expensive and involved than supporting a website.
- Sharing and spreading the word to users and publishers is easier via sharing the website URL on social media, text message, and email. Apps, on the other hand, need to be marketed on their individual app stores.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Web Traffic
SEO means Search Engine Optimization and is the process or a set of best practices used to optimize a website’s configuration, content and popularity so visitors can easily find, search, query and help search engines provide better ranking.
Keywords play an important role in SEO. SEO keywords also known as keywords or keyphrases are terms added to a website content in order to improve search engine rankings. Keywords make it possible for visitors to search your website using search engines. Most keywords are discovered during the keyword research process and are chosen based on a combination of strategies such as volume, competition, capability, e-commerce. One can use a Keyword Researcher – SEO Software. A Software Application That Helps You Discover Long Tail Keywords. It was designed (from the ground up) to be an all-in-one SEO solution that allows you to manage both your keywords and website articles. Keyword Researcher is able to provide solutions to the following questions as part of your keyword research strategy:
- Need to manage thousands of keywords?
- Need help writing SEO-Optimized website articles?
- Want to organize an entire SEO website?
Content placement, Website layout is equally important to boost traffic and provide better customer experience. One can try an Easy Page Builder for a quick jumpstart to build user friendly websites
Website Traffic
If SEO is done right your responsive website will always be ranked higher by search engines, visitors can easily find your website.
You can also use a few tips to boost traffic to your responsive website
- SEO is an important part of generating traffic to your website. Try the best powerful SEO tool suite to boost traffic to your responsive website.
- Flood Your Sites With Free Traffic. A few tips to instantly start generating traffic to your website.
Hope this blog helps small business owners to be strategic with their investment and be able to fulfill their digital presence. Being careful with the initial budget and carefully strategizing the path will help a long way for anyone who is just starting out.
The need for mobile presence is paramount and one cannot simply deny that, however one can build optimized websites, generate traffic, provide meaningful content, optimize and boost conversion rate.