In the middle of this economic crisis, when work and profit are dwindling, it has never been more important to invest in the future of your business. During the last decade we have seen the internet grow into a medium that did not exist the last time the country was in recession. Online, business is being conducted at an astonishing rate. The internet’s growth rate is matched only by the rate of contraction of traditional enterprises.
The world wide web is known by the vast majority as the place to go to find an immediate answer to their question, the solution to problems, or best value item. It’s ideal for window shopping since you can compare several shops in a few short clicks. Although this has been beneficial for many, it has worked against some businesses who do not sell on price.
One thing is certain though, the internet has traffic, and that traffic is a measurable commodity. We know where surfers go, what they are looking for, and from that data we can position websites in their path in order to meet the surfers needs. This has become a very efficient way of buying customers which is in essence what any business does when it advertises. If you look at the acquisition cost of customers online it is much more cost effective than equivalent high street advertising.
The businesses that put themselves in the way of this traffic now by investing in online marketing and promotion are the businesses that will make it through the recession. The economy is predicted to contract by 3.5% during this year, it is then predicted (rather optimistically) to return to growth in 2010. The purpose of this article is not to discuss whether that will happen or not, but if we do see economic growth in 2010, that will make this the least damaging, shortest economy slump on record. After all, having 7% of the population unemployed, still leaves 93% working and spending money.
The smart-thinking business owners in the UK are buying market shares during the recession while their competition are simply trying (and very possibly failing) survive. A few businesses are still growing despite the dry spell in the economy, to be among them is simply a case of moving with the times and making full use of the largest information resource on the planet, which is of course, the world wide web.
Research shows that during an economic boom, for every 10 spent on advertising, you’ll return 19, in an economic slump however, for every 10 spent you’ll return 51. The reason for this is that during a recession there are far fewer companies advertising, so with each advert, there are more customers to be had.
To increase traffic to your website, there options, one of which is “search engine optimization” which basically, is positioning your website near or at the top of search engine “organic” results listings, “Google” primarily, which has over 80% of all search engine traffic. The Pay-Per-Click system is the process of listing your website around the top of Googles paid results. This is a far quicker process than search engine optimization, but in the long run can end up costing far more as it depends on you paying a set fee every time your ad is clicked.
Put both of these mehtods into practice, along with an email newsletter in order to update your clients about what you’re up to, combine with article submission and a blog, and you can end up with a huge online presence, ensuring your company’s survival and growth during the recession.