Regardless of the industry and even size also the marketing is critical for a business’s growth and success. For small and local businesses the digital lead generation could be a game changer. The digital marketing have already surpassed the traditional marketing. Businesses are investing more in the digital marketing and digital communication comparing to the traditional marketing methods. Our heavy reliance on the internet and the tremendous amount of the time we spend on digital media and platforms via mobile phones or the internet browsing, the digital marketing have become the most effective lead generation tool for the businesses.

Here is how small and local businesses can utilize the digital strategies and platforms to generate more quality leads:

Digital Lead Generation: Build a Great Business Oriented Website

These days websites have become an essential for the businesses, no matter what magnitude or size of operation you have or in what industry sector you operate, a website is a must to have channel if you want to compete in the modern era. The Dubai and in fact the entire UAE is heavily digitalized, people living in the country have easy access to the internet and almost everyone owns a mobile phone or a computer. People tend to spend hours on daily bases on the internet and on their smartphones. This have changed the market trends drastically. The digital marketing got a quicker boost, and businesses have also started noticing. Resultantly the digital marketing market have already surpassed the traditional marketing industry since past few years and apparently there is no stopping to it. When it comes to the business website, it is considered to the backbone of the digital strategy. It dictates the entire branding and it establishes a brand identity in the digital world.

That is why it is crucial for a business to have a great web design with business oriented features to ensure maximum online lead generation. Here are some key features of a lead oriented website:

1. Domain Name: The domain name should be unique, easy to remember, should have brand name in it, and if possible add the primary keyword in it too. The primary keyword is your business, for example if you are a hardware store, the primary keyword would be ‘hardware’.
2. Hosting: The website hosting is the most important aspect of user experience. Choose the best available hosting, consider the loading speed and check if the hosting provider is offering easy-to-access technical support or not.
3. CMS: Integrate a good CMS or content management system. The content management system (CMS) allows you to update your website and keep adding content on it without requiring any technical help or website programing knowledge. It is better to go for a popular and open-source (Free) CMS such as WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, etc.
4. User Interface:The user interface of a website allow the users to interact with the website content or its functionalities. The entire web design of the website forms a user interface. It defines how easily or difficultly a user will access and interact with the website content and features. Make sure your user interface is easy-to-use, think from a new visitor’s point of view and prepare your user interface for your targeted audience.
5. Navigation: The navigation is also one of the most important aspect of user experience and user journey. Make sure all of the relevant information are connected with each other and easily accessible. When people have to search for the required information or the next step of the user journey, they usually leave without converting.
6. Hero Area: The hero area of a website’s homepage is the area which appears first when someone visits the website, it contains company logo, business contact details, menu and main image or image slider, some business also use video here. The main goal is that this area should offer a solution to a problem for which you customers will visit you. Image slider is a great choice for small and local businesses.
7. Include Products and Services: After the hero area include all important products and services you are offering. Prepare the content in a way that the user clearly understand what they will get and what kind of problems you can solve. Focus on value proposition message.
8. Add Call To Action (CTA): The call to action or CTA is the most important element for the lead generation. Businesses usually made a lot of mistakes with it. The CTA should be clear, repetitive on appropriate locations and should communicate a clear message. For example, if it is for purchase it should say ‘Purchase Now’ or if it is to contact it should say ‘Request a Quote’ or ‘Contact Us’, etc.
9. Include Trust Signal: For any local or small business it is extremely important to establish trust and build good reputation. Trust signals are extremely important for digital lead generation. It is good to add customer testimonials, rating & reviews, business partners, or anything that can add to your credibility and help increasing user’s trust.
10. Mobile Friendly: The smartphones and mobile devices are dominating the internet, people tend to make more searches from their mobiles than the regular computers/laptops. It is crucial to have a mobile friendly website. Usually such web designs are referred to as responsive web designs.

If a website is good it not only perform well in search engine and generate but it also perform well in lead generation. If the customer experience and customer journey is prepared to obtain higher conversions and all above mentioned aspects are taken care of, the chances are the website will perform much better in online conversions and digital lead generation.

Digital Lead Generation: Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

For small and local businesses one of the best digital lead generation strategy is search engine optimization (SEO). The search engine optimization or SEO can generate a huge amount of organic traffic. The organic traffic is the website traffic which comes from free sources, mainly from the search engines. Whenever someone searches for the product or services your small or local business is offering the search engine shows them the result which have links of the relevant businesses who are offering the searched products or services. It is extremely important that your website also made to the list. For that a small or local business’s website must have to SEO friendly. There are two major things that made a website SEO friendly, one is the programing and the content of the website and the other is the backlinks. Let us take an example of a small restaurant, whose specialty is Mandi Rice, whenever someone will search for a ‘nearby mandi rice restaurant’ or ‘mandi restaurants in Rashidiyah’ the search engine will look up for all the websites listed in its index and then it will return the most relevant results for the users. That is how the SEO works.

Digital Lead Generation:Publish Regular Blogs

Mostly businesses in Dubai and all around the UAE doesn’t host a blog on their website. However it is very important and it can generate a lot of traffic which increase the digital leads. Basically the blogs should be about the products or services you are offering. Think from the customer’s point of view, think about the problem they might be facing or what information your customers or prospects might be looking for and then write blogs on those subjects. A blog can transform a website into a valuable resource for your audiences and provide them another reason to keep visiting your website. The blog and regular content posting increase brand exposure as such content is shared across social media platforms and if you are publishing quality content people will start referring to your website. Such endorsements and referral also help boosting the SEO of the website. Along with blogging, the guest posting on other relevant websites and online publications are also a great technique to increase your exposure and to improve your SEO. This can attract a huge amount of website traffic which definitely increase the digital leads.

Digital Lead Generation: Manage Popular Social Media Platforms

These days the social media has become so popular that an average person living in Dubai or anywhere in the UAE tend to spend hours on social media platforms, messaging apps and in general on their smartphones or mobile devices. The rapid technological advancements and the easy availability of the high-speed internet have made the smartphones and social media platforms more popular in past few years. It is very crucial for a small or local businesses to have a strong presence in the social media. Some social media platforms allow creating closed groups or communities some allow public groups and communities, some allow creating a business page and profile, some even allow selling through social media platforms, all these options can be utilized if applicable. The social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, SnapChat, Tiktok are great for local and small businesses to get a great exposure in the targeted markets. Such exposure help building a good brand identity and attracts more prospects.

Digital Lead Generation: Search Ads or Google Adwords

The Google is one of the most popular search engine tool all over the world. Here in UAE it is clearly dominating by having 96% share of the search market. Moreover the Google is the only dominating search engine in the entire world, there is literally not even any closer match to it. That is why Google is one of the most important factor in the digital marketing. We have already discussed the search engine optimization or SEO. Google is also famous for its paid searches or search ads which it brands as Google Adwords. The Google Adwords is one of the most effective paid digital marketing tool with the highest conversion rate. There is no other digital media or platform that matches with the conversion rate of the Google Ads. The search ads or also referred to as search snippets are small textual ads, which appears on the top of any search result page (SERP). Local and small businesses can utilize the Google Adwords to quickly boost their digital leads and online conversion. Although it is a bit expensive but in the longer run the ROI is much better than any other platform.

Digital Lead Generation: Paid Social Media & Influencer Marketing

Apart from managing social media profiles, pages and groups, social media advertisement is also gaining huge popularity. It is affordable for small and local businesses and the conversion rate is also good. For start the local and small businesses can place paid adverts on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn, and later they can target through other social media platforms as well such as Tiktok, SnapChat or Twitter, etc. The social media advertisement allow the local and small businesses to narrow down their targeted audience and also let them market their products and services to lookalike audience. The small and local businesses can also utilize the remarketing tools to further improve their conversion rate. Another very modern phenomenon is the influencer marketing. For that the local and small businesses can team up with local influencers from popular social media platforms to increase their brand awareness. Which also help scoring more digital leads and also encourage customers to visit your business.

Digital Lead Generation: Email and SMS Marketing

The email and the SMS are the oldest tools to communicate and market your business. Although the technology have advanced too much but these two channels are still relevant and businesses are actively using them to strengthen their marketing strategies. For any local or small business or even for a large business or enterprise it is crucial to maintain an Email and Mobile numbers database. All businesses should collect the Email and Mobile numbers of their customers and visitors. The email database and the SMS database can be very useful for the local and small businesses, they can use it for occasional campaigns, promotions, announcements of new products and services, communication, feedback collection and much more. The SMS and the Emails are a great way to stay in touch with your customers and keep them reminding of your products and services, in addition to that if customers are happy with your products and services they might share them with others via email or SMS. In a long term it could generate a steady stream of quality digital leads and conversions.

Conclusion

For small and local businesses the digital lead generation and the entire digital strategy could be a game changer. As the small businesses and local establishments usually have limited resources and also very confined audience or preferred targeted regions. This makes the digital lead generation an ultimate marketing tool to expand and grow very rapidly. For any small or local business the main goal is to attract more customers either at their digital outlet (website or e-commerce) or either at their physical business. For that the brand identity and brand reputation plays a vital role. Having an excellent business oriented web design, proactive presence at the social media and digital marketing platforms and with a garnishing of little bit of paid advertisement campaigns, you are all set for the moon. The digital domain is the ultimate tool that allow small and local businesses to outshine bigger competition and to establish a good reputation. RSI Concepts is a leading digital marketing and lead generation service provider in Dubai, UAE. If you need to boost up your digital marketing or want to learn more about the subject, feel free to reach us out through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

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