SMALL BUSINESS
MARKETING BLOGActionable advice for small businesses on content marketing, SEO, social media, and more.
Here’s why you need an SSL certificate NOW
Google is about to change the way your visitors view your website, and if you’re not prepared, you could miss out on potential customers and risk damaging your reputation. Starting with Chrome 62, the latest version of its Google Chrome internet browser, Google will...
How to avoid social media fails
This week, we’ve got a guest blog from Agorapulse, who talks about how your small business can avoid social media fails. Back in the good ole days, a single mistake normally wasn’t enough to shift how people viewed your business. Maybe you’d lose a customer here or...
4 ways to build a successful ecommerce brand
This week, we've got a guest blog from David Webb, who gives us the lowdown on building a successful ecommerce brand. Setting up shop, and just sitting there, waiting for customers to barge right into your little online store is not the smartest idea. Without a...
10 marketing ideas for hotels and guest houses
The hospitality industry is one of the most ruthless and competitive, and to stand out you need a strong marketing strategy. This week, we've rounded up ten marketing ideas for hotels and guest houses, covering everything from link building and content marketing to...
How to capitalise on a competitor closing down
No matter how competitive or tumultuous your niche, it’s never fun when a business calls it quits and closes down. It can cause you to think long and hard about your own business and practices, and help you to make some difficult decisions, whether it’s closing...
How to use Halloween to market your business
Seasonal events like Halloween present new opportunities to market your business and reach out to potential new customers. So, before the big day arrives later this month, we’ve rounded up some of the best ways to use Halloween to market your business. Run a...
How to build trust and credibility on your website
If you’ve developed a content marketing strategy to drive traffic to your website and push people through a sales funnel, you’ll no doubt know how difficult it can be to maintain an audience and persuade them to bookmark your page or subscribe to your mailing list....
Why blog commenting is so important for small businesses
If you run a blog, you’ll know how great it can feel when you get a comment from one of your readers thanking you for your advice or continuing the discussion. But when was the last time you left a comment on somebody else’s blog post? Marketing your small business...
6 things to check before submitting your guest post
We've already talked about how to guest blog for your small business, and put together an infographic on the benefits of guest blogging, but today we want to go a step further. If you've followed our advice and landed a guest blog placement on an authoritative website...
Infographic: What are the benefits of guest blogging?
Promoting your small business online can be tough. With so much competition from other small businesses and massive online retailers like Amazon and eBay, it can sometimes feel as though you'll never be able to make an impression online. The good news, though, is that...
The most common link building misconceptions
When it comes to search engine optimisation for small businesses, link building is the way to go. The more quality domains you have linking back to your website, the more “juice” and authority will be passed, and the easier it will be to rank for competitive keywords....
Off-page optimisation techniques to help you rank
This week, we bring you a guest blog from Eliud Mambo. To find out more about contributing to our website, visit our guest blogging page. There is more to off-page SEO than just link building. It is more subtle than that! For example, smart marketers and bloggers know...
26 content marketing ideas for your next blog post
Content marketing is one of the most effective methods of promoting your small business. We've talked about the benefits of content marketing a lot, and we've even created a guide on how to make your content marketing more effective. Today, we want to delve deeper...
6 of the best Google tools and features for small businesses
Marketing a small business can be tough, and in the frenzy of keeping your website updated and keywords climbing, it's easy to splash the cash with a marketing agency instead of utilising the free tools available online. Below, we've rounded up six Google tools and...
Automate on social media without looking like a robot
Let’s face it: we’ve all got a lot going on. But factor in the responsibility of running your own business, and the chances are that you’re rushed off your feet. The last thing you want to think about is marketing your small business online, but it’s essential that...
When are the best times to post on social media?
Social media is one of the most effective tools for small business owners. Every time you post something new on social media, you’re opening your brand to a whole potential new audience - and reminding your existing customers that you’re still alive and kicking....
5 marketing tips for small ecommerce websites
When you think of small businesses, bricks and mortar companies usually spring to mind. However, with entrepreneurs making their way onto the internet to find their slice of the £133 billion online retail sales pie, eCommerce websites have never been more popular. If...
How to repurpose and refresh your social media content
Using social media is one of the best ways of building a brand for your small business on the internet, but it can often be difficult to come up with fresh ideas for new content. Of course, combining your content marketing strategy with your social media strategy will...
How to make your content marketing more effective
Content marketing is one of the most important marketing techniques any small business owner can partake in. We’ve spoken at length about the benefits of content marketing and why, if you’re not the best writer in the world, you should outsource your content marketing...
How to stay motivated when working on your small business marketing strategy
If you’ve taken on the role of promoting your business online, then you may be feeling overwhelmed. Digital marketing can be tough, and unless you set aside the time and have the willingness to learn, it’s easy to lose your motivation and feel like you’re getting...
How to track lead generation through inbound calls
Guest post by Erin Tynan, Windsor Telecom. In an age where business is increasingly handled and promoted online, it’s easy to believe that marketing should remain online too. Sometimes ‘newer’ and ‘shinier’ methods of promotion like PPC, SEO and AdWords are seen as...
7 digital marketing techniques for your café, restaurant or bakery
When it comes to hospitality, food is big business. Britons will spend an incredible £52.2 billion on eating out this year, with more than £2.4 billion of that figure to be spent on morning coffees alone. It’s fair to say that, if you work in food, there’s money to be...
How to improve the customer experience of your ecommerce store
While you are building your ecommerce store’s reputation, don't forget to include user experience as one of your top priorities. Invest in your customers and they will be more than happy to spend their money on your online store. The user experience of an online store...
Here’s why your content marketing isn’t working
With more than two million blog posts published every single day, the internet is getting noisy. In fact, with so much content to contend with, it wouldn’t be a surprise to learn that the majority of today’s content goes unread, unnoticed and doesn't deliver results....
How to improve your copywriting without wasting time
We get it. As great as the benefits of content marketing may sound, finding the time to write impactful and engaging content for your website can be a challenge. Of course, you could outsource your content marketing to an agency, but if you’re on a tight budget or...
How to thank people who comment on your blog
We’ve moved on from the days when comments on a blog post were the biggest indicator of a blogger’s success, but that doesn’t mean that comments are no longer important. In fact, in today’s digital age where everything is done through a tweet or a Facebook share,...
How to make your social media marketing more effective
If you search for the best social media marketing tips online, you’ll be presented with millions of results. Most of them will involve scheduling your posts and automating things like following and unfollowing on Twitter. However, social media marketing has come a...
10 questions to ask before you work with a content marketing agency
Content marketing is one of the very best ways of building your brand. Not only does it position you as an authority figure in your industry and give you resources to share on social media, but it offers significant SEO benefits and encourages visitors to keep coming...
How to start guest blogging as a small business owner
When it comes to launching a new brand online, finding the right exposure can be a challenge. Nowadays, there’s more competition on the internet than ever before – in fact, more than 140,000 new websites launch every day, and more than two million blog posts are...
Why you should outsource your content marketing
Content marketing is one of the most important marketing techniques for small business owners. Not only is it relatively inexpensive when compared to pay-per-click, sponsorship and offline marketing tactics like newspaper advertising and cold calling, but it’s easy to...