Many South African small businesses fail to maximise the marketing potential of digital media, because they simply don't know how to use them effectively, says MTN Business.
Greg Hatfield, General Manager: Marketing, Products & Solutions at MTN Business, says this emerged during the development of the MTN Business Build Your Business Online (BYBO) suite of solutions and 'Rescue Me' campaign to save the sites of up to 50 000 former users of WozaOnline services.
The MTN BYBO development and consulting team discovered during its work with SMEs that many small businesses are not making good use of the myriad free or low-cost digital marketing opportunities available to them.
Hatfield says many are not aware of the basics of effective social media marketing, for example. "Many don't know the basics of using Facebook to promote their business, or how best to respond to criticism on social media. They don't know how best to track social media interactions. Some try, but often ineffectively. They need to realise that engaging on social media is a full-time job."
In many cases, SMEs are aware that it is important to have an online presence, but they fail to maximise the potential of the sites they create. Hatfield says: "Most people don't do search engine optimisation very well. For example, many will have 'home' as the title of their landing page. But, the title of the landing page is very important from an SEO perspective." Links to social media and other sites are also typically neglected; landing pages tend to focus on the company rather than its products, and design is generally poor in terms of navigation. Often, site owners aren't aware of tools such as Google Analytics, or don't know how to track trends to improve their business.
Aiming to address these common pitfalls, the MTN Business BYBO services include consultations and workshops with teams of experts, who assist SMEs in analysing and improving their site design and SEO, developing impactful social media campaigns and even assisting with e-mail and SMS marketing.
"The reality is that every business is different, and has different needs and different approaches that should be taken to marketing. We begin with an SEO analysis and recommendations on improving their site. Then, depending on their needs and the package they have, we can offer expert individual consultations on site design and SEO, marketing through various digital channels, and managing social media interactions."
MTN BYBO services also include e-mail and SMS marketing tools and access to MTN Directory Services, which allows businesses to advertise their store locations to MTN subscribers using the directory app.
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