5 Clever Ways to Attract More Customers

1. Optimise your website

Ensuring your website stands out to potential customers is a sure-fire way of attracting more traffic to your business. Knowing and implementing the basics of search engine optimisation — known as SEO — will increase the quality and quantity of traffic to your website, and from there to your bricks and mortar business.

At their core, search engines do three things when it comes to delivering content to the user; crawling, indexing and ranking. This is the process of discovering, cataloguing and presenting relevant content available on the internet. By practicing good SEO, you increase the chances of your website being found by potential customers. 

Here are three quick things you can do to optimise your website for improved searchability.

Check for simple mistakes

Check your site for small technical errors that may be stopping your site from coming up in rankings. Some of the most common SEO mistakes are easy fixes.

Use keywords in your website copy

Research what your customers are searching the internet for, and then work these keywords into your content. When choosing which keywords to target, opt for long-tail keywords; 70% of searches use a mix of keywords that have 3 or more words in them. It is important to think in human terms and incorporate these keywords in a way that benefits user experience.

Create shareable and engaging content

This will help your site rank higher and keep audiences coming back for more. It can be a tricky thing to get right, but keeping up with the latest trends in your industry and getting the timing right will help. 

2.  Ask for reviews on Google My Business

Getting customers to review your business is a free and easy way of increasing your online reputation — influencing a higher ranking on Google, as well as your future customers.

Positive feedback is highly influential. Around 88% of people say a good review will increase the amount of trust they place in a business. 

Another benefit of getting customer reviews on Google is that it helps with SEO and increases online exposure, particularly when the person searching for your business is local. Customer reviews account for about 15% of the method Google uses to rank local searches. The higher the number of reviews you have, the more likely the algorithm will prioritise your business online above competitors.

Reviews are a two-way conversation. While responding to positive reviews is important for your business, it is equally important to respond to any negative reviews in a timely manner. If you receive a negative review, best practice is to acknowledge the issue, apologise and provide an explanation (if necessary), then invite the reviewer to discuss the matter offline.

3. Boost your Facebook posts

A Boosted Post is the simplest form of advertising you can do on Facebook. Effectively, in exchange for a small amount of money, your Facebook post will appear in more people’s news feeds. 

Getting more traction on your social media posts is an important step in attracting people to your business. The organic reach of Facebook posts in general is declining, as the algorithm prioritises paid content. By boosting your Facebook posts, you expand the reach of your content and expose more people to your business — including your followers who may not have seen it organically.

You can boost a Facebook post for as little as $1 a day, making it a budgetable option for those just beginning to dabble in online marketing. The more you spend, the more people your post will reach. 

4. Use Geotags on your Instagram posts

It’s not just Facebook that can help drive more customers to your business. When used correctly, Instagram is a powerful marketing tool. 

Instagram’s Geotag is an underutilised Instagram feature that will help more local consumers find you. It’s simply a geographic location, tagged in your Instagram post or story. Learning how to use this functionality will not only help to get your content shown in more people’s feeds, but also target consumers in your local area, or people looking for posts in that area. It’s a minimal-effort way to increase your online visibility. 

Geotags can be added to all Instagram photos on your profile, by simply clicking ‘Add location’ before you post. You can also tag places on your Instagram story by adding a sticker with your nearest location. 

For more tips on enhancing your Instagram profile, read our blog about building a community on Instagram.

5. Create listings on the major directories

For the greatest reach online, make sure your business has a presence on the major listing sites. All of the below are free directories that your business could be featured on, with the option to pay for advanced features such as adding photos or videos or being able to track traffic data.

• Google
• Apple Maps
• Facebook
• True Local
• Glassdoor
• Foursquare
• Yellow/White Pages
• Bing
• HotFrog
• ShowMeLocal

Niche directories, such as TripAdvisor, could also be applicable for some businesses

Being included on these websites will help improve your business’s visibility on search engines. It is important to keep all your listings updated and consistent — that means having the right business hours, location, and any other helpful information such as customer parking availability — and to make sure you have your preferred URL on all of them.

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