I know as a business owner you might be feeling overwhelmed with all the various digital marketing concepts, but a great way to help you bring it all into focus is the term SoLoMoCo, which stands for Social-Local-Mobile-[e]Commerce. As we head into 2013, making sure your business is positioned to take advantage of all four of these channels will help keep it afloat in the changing times.
Social
This is what most of us are familiar with to some extent. It’s the Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, LinkedIn and myriads of other social networks. Social media is word of mouth on steroids. It facilitates a relationship between your company and the customer. This is impossible to do on a website – unless you have a blog (another social tool if commenting is allowed). It’s important that you choose the right social medium for your business and target market – there is no need to be on all.
Local
If you have a business that is tied to a local community for sales, then focusing on being found and relevant locally is extremely important. The “Buy Local” and “Support Small Business” movements are growing as the local economy tries to survive the global economic collapse. If your business can marry the strong relations to the community via offline engagement with those of targeted online marketing it will go a long way in keeping the doors open even in tough economic times.
Mobile
This one is relatively new on the scene buy very important. Not convinced? Try on these stats for size:
- 60% of consumers do product or service research “several times a month” via a mobile device
- 9 out of 10 mobile searches lead to action; over half lead to a purchase
- 90% of text messages are read within 3 MINUTES of being delivered
If your website, is not optimized for mobile you can be missing out on web traffic and potential sales. After your site is mobile-friendly, the next mobile marketing you take on should be text messages. Done right, SMS marketing can be a welcomed piece of advertising from your business.
[e]Commerce
Now is the time to revamp your sales process to include digital media. The internet is no longer a place to get found or even just to communicate. It is a place to do business – and very good business at that. Consider that this year’s Cyber Monday sales exceeded last year’s by 30% doing over $1.5 billion in sales. Tie mobile in and you get this marketing nugget from CNN Money: “A growing number of people used their mobile devices to make purchases this year. About 18% of shoppers checked out deals on their mobile devices on Monday, and 13% made purchases by phone or tablet —up from 12% and 7%, respectively, last year.” Case in point: Do business online. Make sure it is optimized for mobile.
If you can remember SoLoMoCo, Social-Local-Mobile-[e]Commerce as you develop your marketing plan and budget for 2013, you’ll be sure to be on the cutting edge of a thriving business. You seriously ignore these at your own peril. That is not a scare tactic; it is the new reality we live in – not tomorrow, but TODAY. Don’t even think about going into the new year without considering the new SoLoMoCo economy in your marketing.
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