You’ve created a great business. Taken a great idea, refined and polished it. And now your baby is out there for the world to see, shiny website and all. But the big question is how to make your business more visible?
All businesses need to grow and scale, making it imperative that they have visibility. Advertising helps, so does a great social media presence.
But in the ever-growing noise of web and social content, it seems hard and sometimes downright impossible to make an impact. Leads are dependent on traffic, which in turn is a factor of ranking and visibility. Plus, there is always a lot of technology to navigate through.
Try these 25 proven ways to boost visibility for your business and increase traffic.
What works often depends on the kind of business one is in and there is no one size fits all. Numerous small business owners and solopreneurs share their expert tips on what works for them and why. Customize the combination for your kind of business and get closer to achieving that elusive visibility.
Think Big, Focus on making your business visible locally
How can you up your local reach? Three simple, but key steps – claim listings, share info, optimize data!
The essential way to build local visibility is listing your business on local search services like Google My Business or Bing Places for Business. They are free, and also a great way to manage your online presence with customers in your area. And even if they are not, local is often the best way to grow initially.
Add to this, when you share & update the relevant info regularly, you are more likely to show up high in searches. So the next time customers in your area are looking for a boutique, a chiropractor or even a catering service, they will find you.
Focus on improving your local visibility helps, suggests Camille le Goff of Mash Media. Plus, encourage customers to leave reviews about your business.
Ways to improve local visibility
Bret Bonnet of Quality Logo Products says, make sure you claim all of your online profiles from Facebook to the Yellow Pages and your Name, Address and Phone number (called NAP) are consistent on all listings as well. This is important for authority/ranking signal used by many of the business listing aggregator websites (Google Local, Apple Maps, etc.).
Get on a larger directory site but make sure it is a highly rated one.(e.g: Facebook, Pinterest, YouTube, Linkedin, in addition to Google or Bing etc.) This adds credibility – I found that my name and services quickly indexed in subsequent google searches, says Bruce W. Cameron.
Example of a Google My Business Listing
Cody Clifton, Director of Commerce for Wholesale Lanyards recommends using tools like MOZ Local and Yext to save the time and hassle of updating the information manually. The tools do come at a price, he says, but they’re well worth it in the long run. The more complete and accurate your listing is, the higher you show in local searches.
Use Google My Business
Google My business is the top free listing site for your business. It gives you both business and map visibility and you can add products, promotions, business freebies regularly. Plus, your customers can post their reviews which helps your business.
Clifton also recommends including a description of your business along with interlinking important keywords. Another feature that many people miss out on is the ability to add photos of their business’ exterior, interior, team members, logos, and more.
With great search features by skill or location, and beautiful,comprehensive profiles, list your own business for Free on Maroon Oak to connect or collaborate with women entrepreneurs and professionals from over 30 industries looking for services like yours.
Plus, top freelance job opportunities and business freebies. It’s FREE!
Morgan Bachemin, Digital Ads Director at Online Optimism warns that often if your local listings page is not kept updated when people are searching for your company specifically, it is discouraging for customers. When a healthcare client who had been limited in treating patients out of a trailer in a remote area for over a year, finally built a full-service agency, the photo for their Google My Business page was still that trailer. It was incredibly confusing and off-putting to potential patients.
Bing Places is similar to GMB for gaining local visibility. It may have a smaller share of the market but you don’t want to miss it.
Check out these 23 awesome places to list your business for free!
SEO – Grow your visibility online
In other words, Just. Google. It
For businesses, the main source of traffic and views continues to be organic and through search engines and that’s where your efforts should be directed. Focus at least some of your efforts on SEO, recommends Tim Grinsdale, Director of TOAD® Diaries. It’s often considered too difficult or technical by many young businesses. However, focusing on ‘long-tail’ keywords on your website and social media profiles can generate some easy low-hanging fruit opportunities.
Case in point – you can list ‘cupcakes’ as your main keyword and compete with a lots of others – often bigger sites – who use it. Instead, use a long tail one like ‘gluten free vegan cupcakes’ to up the possibility of your being listed higher on Google searches.
Looking for the best resources to improve your SEO and ‘findability’?Stand Out From the Crowd
What differentiates you can drive your success!
You don’t have to be the square in a sea of circles. Even if your product isn’t unique, sharing a meaningful USP (unique selling proposition) can be the a strong differentiator.
Create/ Rehearse a short pitch (verbal and written) that includes what service you provide, what customer you serve, and how you help that customer solve a specific problem. Ask 5 to 10 peers for feedback, then refine your oral pitch. Use a very short version of this pitch for all digital presence, and the longer version for in-person introductions. This works because a concise statement that gives your business context is easy to understand, and people can quickly figure out how you can add value says Margeaux Sullivan, Founder, Quest Complete Consulting
Think of it like a Twitter bio – how best can you share an intro in 140 characters or less?
Sharing video is an even more compelling way to position yourself. You could do short how-to videos to demonstrate your expertise and build visibility. An online portfolio is another way to stand out and win the right clients!
Find out how you can share your expertise with our Members?
Lori Cheek of Cheekd has an interesting story to share for an out of the box visibility statement. “At the Dublin Web Summit when over 800 startups were exhibiting (90% of them were men), I decided to stand out by wearing Angel Wings throughout the conference (I have a dating business). When I was checking out of my hotel to head back to NYC, I looked down at Judy Dench on the cover of the Irish Times and there I was right next to her. (It was me on my laptop with my Angel Wings— inside there was another 1/4 page picture mentioning my business).
Want visibility with a large audience of accomplished women via email?
Your brand. Our Newsletter. A match well made!
Influencers Rule! Engage with them!
For a small business owner, it’s never been easier to reach out to micro or mid-tier experts and access their sphere of influence. You can use tools like Social Media to first interact and then connect for a co-branding campaign.
Brandon Chopp, Digital Marketing Strategist, iHeartRaves uses influencer marketing as part of digital marketing strategy for their ecommerce brand. They find popular accounts on Instagram or use a platform called Tomoson, (comes with a free trial) a tool that helps pair influencers with brands. Often times, they send a product to an influencer for free, in exchange for an honest review on their blog or social media followers. The most important element of an influencer package aside from cultural fit, is the overall reach of their blog or social media accounts.
“We measure our return on investment based on the number of impressions and referral traffic we get. And of course – how many sales come as a result of the campaign, ” adds Chopp.
Connect with collaborators and influencers from 30+ industries!
Stay Social – how make your business visible on social media
Go Beyond Facebook Pages
Bryan Clayton, CEO of GreenPal recommends active participation in relevant Facebook GROUPS (especially local ones) to gain new customers and boost visibility for your small business.
Also read: How to maximize Facebook Groups for you and your business.
FB now has a dedicated mobile app to support their groups’ communities. So it’s easier than ever to manage the groups that you participate in, monitor the conversations, and participate while on the go throughout your day, he adds.
Choose a few good groups where you can actively engage and develop relationships. Remember to follow the 80/20 content rule – share advice and resources 80% and pitch only 20%.
Join our Facebook Group Maroon Oak’s Business and Career Networking for women FB Group
Use Pinterest as a traffic driver
Contrary to the general belief of Pinterest being a substitute magazine pinboard, today, it’s a huge and extremely popular search engine. The best part – Pinterest visuals have a longer shelf life than posts on Facebook or Twitter, and there is always the potential of a pin getting back into viral circulation months later.
Pinterest is the best way to gain visibility for a small business for free, suggests Chris Gronkowski, CEO of Ice Shaker and Owner, Everything Decorated. If you have a product or service geared towards female customers, Pinterest is a huge asset. Pinterest doesn’t just drive a lot of traffic to your website, it also brings customers that are ready to purchase. Your images on Pinterest will also rank on Google search very easily, which is an added bonus.
Kristin Marquet, Founder & Creative Director of Creative Development Agency says that she uses Pinterest to build each email list and send subscribers through her sales funnel.
At Maroon Oak, we often create multiple pins for the same blog post. Not only is it a great way to drive more traffic, it also serves as an A/B test, to learn what resonates with our audience.
Find out how you can set up and maximize Pinterest for your Business
Do you have an eCommerce business? Learn the steps for how to sell on Pinterest.
Engage with Instagram
Instagram is visual, yes, but it’s also an extremely popular social platform and shouldn’t you go where your customers are?
Ksenia Newton, Digital Marketing Manager CrossCap feels that Instagram helps drive ROI. The more different touch points you have with the users, the better chances of converting them into customers. Offer a discount or temporary promotion via Instagram Stories! Or even a campaign a giveaway, a poll or Influencer marketing campaigns with users with a lot of engaged followers and asking them to promote your product or service. For User Generated Content and micro influencer marketing, find users who have a following of 1000 – 10k followers. Start interacting with them. Perhaps, you’ll be able to send them your product and ask him/her to feature that product on their Instagram page to get a review. Also, you can ask if you can repost something from their wall onto yours.
Hashtags are the most popular search on Instagram. For leveraging Instagram for visibility, don’t use the same hashtags for every picture. At Maroon Oak, we use a few new ones every time to reach a more diverse audience with every post. For every new upload on Instagram, look for related hashtags to your current image theme.
Need some help? Here are some great Tips to start on Instagram.
Wondering what to do next on Instagram? Read Smart Tips to Rock your Business Instagram.
Don’t miss these winning hacks (and bonus tools)
Make your profile and content more searchable, engage smartly and cash on what’s trending!
Social CRM
Author Natasha Kvitka has ideas on using customer data – Use your CRM to spot the customers with active social media accounts, and reach out to them on Twitter, Instagram etc after the purchase; thank them for their business, offer additional information on the products,or even invite them to follow the brand on social media. After such interactions, the customer might consider leaving your business positive feedback, and even their public replies may work as testimonials. Though that does not substitute other ways of online reputation management, still it increases visibility and allows you to reach a wider audience.
Invest in Content for value and visibility
Build a Blog
Kenneth Burke, Marketing Director at Text Request feels that after initially listing your site anywhere (reliable) that you can find, blogging and guest blogging can help you continue building trust, gain visibility and drive growth.
With an awesome audience of women entrepreneurs and professionals and a high Alexa rating, check out the leading Business and Career blog for women- Maroon Oak, for answers to a lot of your entrepreneurial and careers questions.
Google’s top two ranking factors (for websites) are links and content, says Casey Tongg, Digital Marketing Strategist at CFR Rinken. If done correctly, having a blog on your website gives you the opportunity for both of these. If you’re able to update your blog frequently and consistently, your site’s visibility improves with Google (and brings repeat visitors to your site). Investing the time and resources to create blog content, even if it’s just a couple articles a month, is extremely beneficial.
Here’s the thing though. Don’t create content for the sake of it. Instead, be smart and cater content to your audiences needs.
Round-ups are a great way to gain visibility while simultaneously contributing to the content. The experts who contribute get visibility and they in turn share your blog on their social platforms. A win-win for all.
These tips from 8 professionals on How to Perfect Your Business Pitch is another example of a successful round-up.
Are you wondering how to start a blog or how to monetize your blog?
Get these blogging tools and freebies from the top experts!
Connect with the Press
Dan Roberge, President of Maintenance Care favors earning high-quality links through HARO, (or Help A Reporter Out). Some of the best quality links can be built with authoritative sites from reporters and writers asking for information & help. These often have high Domain Authority, which can have a positive impact for your own website’s ranking in the search engines.
PR Web can be used for Press releases to different outlets. It’s not free, but their reach makes it worth considering if you have a big launch or announcement to publicize.
Twitter is a great place to research, follow and connect with journalists in your sphere of influence.
Make it about the Customer
One of Margo Schlossberg clients started a customer profile series called “Spotlight On” for her clients, a high-end menswear store selling both custom and off the rack in a retail space. By getting the clients to talk about their business and posting on LinkedIn, they could get their peers to see and comment on the photo.
It was a great way to make customers feel special as well as to have content engagement by a similar demographic.
Make a list the movers & shakers, people you admire and prospects, ask a few smart open-ended questions then sit back and take notice. They will be more than happy to tell you what is on their mind. It does not cost much – for the price of a few coffees and meals you will get an earful. If you listen to what they share with you there will be plenty of opportunities to help them. It is a great way to connect and a lot of fun too.
Individual members on Maroon Oak get free visibility via Spotlight, Email campaigns, Video Blog and Social Media initiatives. What does it take to be a member? It’s free! All it needs is an email id to sign up. Don’t think twice. Join now!
Monitor Your Reputation
Customer feedback is the ultimate truth!
As important as testimonials and appreciation are, negative public feedback can damage a business’ reputation significantly. Online and social listening can help you know, respond and sometimes even avert a disaster.
Repwarn is a tool that helps track negative and positive reviews of a business online, and also watches out for competitor keywords, recommends Walt Bayliss of Universal Media Online. Now, it may not be the first-line visibility you’re looking for. But it’s a great tool that boosts visibility because it helps entrepreneurs engage with business customers right away through notifications.
Derek Hines’ Company West Coast Self-Storage uses Get Five Stars, an online review site to get customer testimonials and reviews for their locations. “The system emails the customer, asking them how their service was. These reviews then show up on their website because of the widget we installed. The best part is that those reviews show up in Google SERPs and in the Knowledge Graph. Since those have been showing up, our click-through rates (CTR) have skyrocketed, he adds, which has led to higher rankings, since Google values CTR.”
Project Authenticity – First & Last
Credibility is when your customers know you care!
Be brave and real with everyone you meet, and meet as many people as possible, suggests Libby Dickerson, Founder of Better Business Designer. You may be surprised when you do this how many people genuinely want to help you. Sometimes in business, the challenge can be to appear like we have it all figured out.
It’s important that your small business comes across as a credible resource for anyone researching what you offer. You can provide free, online guides to show customers how to choose exactly what they need, adds Bret Bonnet. You can also make the ordering process as simple as possible. That way, your website stands apart from the rest, whether you’re selling vacuums or providing a dog grooming service!
More than you your product (or service), it’s the way you engage with your audience that keeps them coming back.
Leverage the Power of Reviews & Referrals
You cannot make it alone in the world of online business, or in any other business, says Andrew Spence, the Founder of Jiggle Digital. Referrals from complementary businesses can be a great way to increase your visibility and be a source of customers. Because they already know what they want and are ready to buy.
If you are in the health and nutrition niche, you could partner up with a business that sells fitness equipment online. You can access a ready market through this kind of strategic partnership.
Tiffany Powell of Sapphire Bookkeeping & Accounting also supports online reviews. It really depends on what industry you are in, but we have found that referrals is the best way of advertising for us. We continuously encourage clients to post reviews on Google, Facebook, Yelp or anywhere really. A high rating on Yelp really helps on google searches, she adds.
Also read: Ways to get customer feedback & what to do with it.
Consider Promotional Products to make your small business more visible
According to ArrtPromotions, 58% of people hang on to their promotional products. Rachel Stephens of TotallyPromotional.com feels that Entrepreneurs looking to grow their small business should not ignore the power of promotional products. Custom-printed pens or can coolers are great giveaways for any business, she says. We also suggest unique items like hand sanitizer or tote bags if they suit a business.
If investing in a lot of promotional products is not yet in your budget, why not start with something small. Or maybe one with a cool or witty message!
When choosing promotional products, check out this blog on some great facts on Promotional products.
There is no one formula for visibility – it often takes a combination of strategy and smart tactics to break away from the noise. Sometimes, one key action will do it. But it mostly takes small but sustained steps to gain traction and stay visible.
In the final analysis, a good business creates products, services and brands. A great one also creates customers, advocates and champions!
Disclaimer: The views in this article are from the author and the contributors. Maroon Oak (company) takes no responsibility for any of the recommendations posted here. Nor has the author or the company been compensated in any way for sharing the links or mentions.
Pooja Krishna is an Entrepreneur, Business Mentor and Mom. She has worked both in large corporates and managed startups over the last 20+ years.
She’s a co-founder at Maroon Oak, and is founded Win Thinks, where she writes, speaks and teaches about Digital Media, Brand Building and Future Ready Businesses. A day trader for over a decade, Pooja launched Trading Paces to educate amateur and pro stock traders. As a classroom mentor, Pooja loves teaching students across the U.S. about job skills and entrepreneurship. Read about her on Huffington Post and Forbes.
A trivia buff and yoga & hula hoop enthusiast, she’s discovering the pleasure of drawing Zentangle patterns for ‘creative mindfulness.’
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Nice Publication! I will learn alot from here
This is an awesome post! Thanks for the share.
Thanks for sharing this one. Will apply this to our business.
Following these smart ways truly boost our business!
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Interesting content. Looking for more.
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Great and informative website. Looking for more.
Very well written content. Keep sharing the great work.
Nice article you shared. Thanks for posting this here.
I’m glad to see this page
SEO and particularly GMB have really helped my business flourish
Thanks for these tips. I am actually enjoying using Pinterest for my Business. And I am starting to do SEO for my website. Gotta make sure to do the other tips listed! Thanks!
We’re working on increasing our visibility right now so these are great tips. Thank you!
Wise tips. I can tell you got the groove, and you’r passing on to me. Thanks! Keep on grooving!
I like your idea to use a service to ask customers for reviews for your business. I think it’s also important to be sure your business is listed in all pertinent directories. That way, people looking for a specific service or business type can find you more easily.
A website is the online identity of your business. In the age where the world is moving towards digital, it’s shocking to see how many businesses still ignore having an online presence. Your customers expect you to have a digital presence where they can find more information about you and your products or services.
Everyone should try Search Engine Optimization. It really helped my websites a lot!
I love how efficient these tips are. Super practical.
This is absolutely great! I’ve tried this 25 ways and somehow help me with business visibility. Thanks a lot for sharing this!
Amazing 25 ways/tips to boost visibility. It would really help businesses like mine. Thanks a lot!
Lots of great tips Pooja, thanks for your advice! I’ll definitely take them into consideration with my towing business in Visalia. So many people overlook things like SEO, standing out from the crowd, connecting with press, and so many other things that you mentioned, with the assumption that if they take action, eventually people will come to their business, and unfortunately, that’s just not how it works.
A whole lot to think about here, thanks so much. Ive just strted tacking google my business, but its clear I can do a whole lot more.
Instagram is absolutely huge and in certain niches, one of the easiest ways to start building up some visibility and engagement with your target audience.
These are SUCH awesome tips!! Thank you so much for sharing!
really, really good stuff here.
These are great tips! Now that I’m blogging, I hope to turn into a brand and a small business. Very great resource.
I love all your methods but I’m stuck on the pinterest part. because I’m not exactly sure how it works and how it link back to my blog. As in all my images loaded via flickr has that Pinterest sign, but I don’t know how it will help!
Hey Tiffani, that’s a great question.
Pins via Pinterest button from the images on your blog link back directly to the url where they were created.
A quick tip here: Pinterest by default uses the images ALT tags to create descriptions for the pins. User can change them but it’s not a usual case.
So by adapting your ALTs for that purpose (adding your blog’s name in them, giving more details about the blog post) you give your pins better potential and cover more keywords that can drive more users from the Pinterest search to your website.
I work in digital marketing, and all of these tips are SPOT ON! I loved reading through this and getting someone else’s perspective!
These are great tips. I hope that Pinterest turns into a bigger way to drive traffic for my blog. I get more repins from my other boards than from my board that specifically are for blog posts. But, the visibility is helpful.
Your tips are beneficial. Staying social through social media have a huge impact on any online or any other business in today’s world. Great read.
Thank you for those tips – this is super informative! I have a small business so this is great for me to put in action!
These tips are really great, so smart, inspiring and encouraging. Thank you for sharing, I will definitely use them.
This is really helpful to me. I feel kind of embarrassed to admit that I did not know some of these technical terms and/or the meanings of them though. Thank you for sharing this valuable information.
This is such a great resource! Thanks for all the great tips~!
Super helpful advice! SEO is hands down the most important method and really great for every business owner to learn the basics.
I am working on Pinterest but getting no where. I feel social media sucks the life out of me sometimes … haha … Great tips though!
❥ tanvii.com
You are so right with all those points. I absolutely need to get my SEO and Pinterest in shape. Thanks for the motivation, will make some workplan for the coming days to get it sorted.
Every business should own their Google Business Listing and it’s astonishing how many don’t. It’s the first step into being seen by the customers, and it’s known that people won’t scroll down from the first results on the maps when they are searching for a local business.
Super helpful! It’s always a guessing game to me on visibility- basically just do your best type of thing. So this is useful!
Great tips! SEO is so important and ranking for more specific things can help a business.
Fantastic post, so informative! Thank you for sharing! This would be very useful to my brother-in-law who started his own business up last year, I may have to pass your post along to him!
Thank you sooooo much for these tips, I really appreciate it Pooja. It’s a huge struggle to get the message out there, especially in the online world when there are so many sites doing the same thing.
Really great tips! I’ve been better at getting the word out about my business in the bigger world, but locally people are only just now realizing what I do – and I’ve been doing it for 10 years!
These are all great tips. I want to open a small business in the near future and I’ll have to keep all of these in mind to make sure I’m off on the right foot!
Absolutely practical tips.. I am working on Instagram and Pinterest now!
Staying social & word of mouth is huge for our small biz! Great read.
Xx- Ashley