As entrepreneurs and small-business owners, you have to pick and choose what you pay to have done by other professionals—bookkeeping, IT, design, web marketing, social media marketing, etc. Do what you do best, pay others to do the rest, right?
Make sure you aren’t just spending on help…be sure you are investing in truly professional support.
It kills me when I see business owners who end up wearing multiple hats, trying to do tasks they’re not professionally trained for. Just because you CAN do something, doesn’t mean it’s the best use of your time or it’s in the best interest of your business. Can I cut my own hair? Sure, I could, but would that be a good idea?
Web marketing services are still young enough as a concept (compared to older, traditional mediums) that I see less experienced business owners who don’t yet see the value this critical medium (managed professionally) adds to their overall business. I don’t just mean having a website or being on social media, but actually doing it well…consistently and professionally.
Web marketing is often left off the list when it comes to choosing what to invest in. You might spend time on it, but are you actually investing in it so it’s helping you scale your business? In today’s digital business world, staying ahead means investing in digital business practices, and that includes marketing.
Digital marketing is more than just having the tools – the website, social media, emails, etc. It’s using the tools strategically to brand, build and boost business.
Here are some reasons to consider hiring professional help to support you with digital marketing:
1. Everything is made to represent your brand.
Professional content marketers have one thing in common: they are paid to understand your brand and incorporate its lifeblood into all materials. That includes everything from logo design to writing style.
Plus, pros make note of every single brand asset during their content audits, so they can diagnose their current state and recommend the right changes (if any). Tempting as it may be to save a little money and hire your nephew or a cheap source to do this work, if they are not a professional web marketer, chances are, they’ll miss a few things on the way or be inconsistent and you’ll wind up spending money anyway fixing improper branding.
2. Your brand will be enjoyable and desirable to experience.
Professional web and social media marketers design experiences for a living, so they understand how the different pieces of that experience work together in a way that company owners are usually too close to the business to see – websites, graphics and messaging are all examples.
Even when you know the basics, having a professional build and manage the online experience for your customers can ensure a smoother, more enjoyable overall experience. So many people want to get visitors TO their websites, but too many fail to help get people THROUGH it!
3. You keep pace with industry changes.
Those changes could be new methods for marketing or they could be new technologies. Often, those two things come rolled up in the same package. And while it would be amazing if all of us could stay up to date on every single new app and “digital experience” happening, no one person can possible keep track of it all, let alone understand what’s worth time and money.
Digital marketing professionals, whether they’re making websites, sending tweets, or writing blog posts, get paid to keep an eye on these things. They are in it daily, not just for you, but for other clients. In turn, it pays for you to have their expertise at hand.
4. Mistakes aren’t always reversible.
Not easily, at any rate. A post with glaring typos seen my too many people (even after being edited or deleted) can cheapen your brand. You don’t have to get to that point to make a change, though. As I always say, start small.
Pick one or two aspects of web marketing you think could really use a professional eye and opinion. Once you start to see the payoff from having solid digital marketing efforts, it will get easier to place your company’s branding in the hands of others.