Be Visible Online – what Does That Mean?

If nobody knows you, nobody can look for you. This is where the challenge of online marketing lies: to be on site with the right information exactly when the potential customer is dealing with the problem that your offer could solve for him. A few years ago, this was the sole task of search engine optimization and search engine marketing. But as the Internet has grown, so has the number of steps businesses can take to make new contacts online. Therefore, nowadays, “visibility” is used in this context. You have to be there when the prospect needs you.

Customer Journey

In order to build up targeted visibility, you must first identify the “customer journey” of your customers. This keyword refers to the possible ways in which interested parties could come into contact with you: via search results on Google, Amazon or in the Apple Store, via Twitter posts and YouTube videos, via print or online advertisements and so on. Depending on when such a “touch point” is located in the customer journey, the customer has different needs.

At the very beginning she may have a vague interest in the topic or is doing cautious preliminary research (“When is it worth having your own car?”, “International cuisine at a glance”, “Abdominal muscle training for beginners”). Maybe she doesn’t even know that an offer like yours could be the answer to your question – and is not even interested in a specific offer. The situation is different with the search for “buy used cars online”, which could follow at a later point in time. And after the purchase, of course, there is the topic of customer loyalty.

At the end of your analysis, you will know where your desired customer is and can track whether you are already there at these points – with the right advertisements, on the right channels, matching the right search terms.

Measure Visibility

In order to get to know the customer journey, determine the specific measures required and then check success, you must be able to measure your reach. Web analysis tools will help you with this. Among other things, the following can and must be evaluated:

the activities on your website: not only the number of your website visitors and what they are doing there, but also, for example, how they found you (links, search engines, social media), which search terms they may have entered, whether your website has the has provided the information you are looking for (keyword bounce rate and length of stay), whether you are visiting the website for the first time, and much more.

the activities on your social channels and marketplaces: Practically every large social network nowadays offers a built-in analysis option that automatically measures access numbers, clicks and so on. Anyone who sells on marketplaces such as ebay, Amazon or etsy has access to analyzes of the internal search functions.

Your current standing on Google: Free tools such as the Google Search Console or the Google Keyword Planner (can be used after registering a free Google Ads account), but also some very powerful and extensive paid tools such as Sistrix or Searchmetrics, help. Also measure the activities and main topics of your competitors!

What you should measure and which figures are relevant for you results from the goal that you are pursuing with your company. These goals must be understandable based on the analysis data: the number of retweets that you would like to achieve on Twitter, the number of desired website visitors, the conversion rate (which shows how many of the visitors then also complete a purchase) and so on.

Google And His Friends

Even if the topic of visibility has become much larger, the search engine still plays a significant role, because no other node is visited by more German users when they want to find out something online – over 90% of them use Google. But there is much more to Google than its search function.

Google is not only a constant companion in the everyday life of Internet and mobile phone users with services such as Google My Business, Gmail, the Google Map and the sale of various end devices; the Google group also owns the video platform YouTube, among other things.

Many Google channels converge on the search results page of the classic Google search: In the “organic” search results list, not only suitable websites but also company portraits and map details, videos, images and news appear. When it comes to questions of knowledge, Google also likes to give out direct answers that are taken from Wikipedia, for example. There are also paid advertisements. In order to be visible as high up as possible in this colorful mishmash, you have to take many different measures. But of course there are also great opportunities in this!

The Right Keywords And Topics

No matter what platform you are on, whether you place ads or trust the power of your content: You will only appear in the right place if you can convince the algorithm that you have the ideal answer to deliver the respective search query. Thanks to your analyzes, you know which inquiries are frequently typed into the search box and which are of interest to you.

But instead of limiting yourself to optimizing texts for individual search queries, with the knowledge of your customer journey in the back of your head, you should think in terms of the subject areas that you want to cover. You have to understand the problems and questions that concern your potential customers and speak the language of the searcher. In other words, you need to do content marketing.

Link Building And Social Media

Of course, you can and must also be visible in other places on the Internet. In addition to the many social networks, depending on the industry, rating portals, price search engines and relevant websites on related topics are particularly important. Google perceives such activities as so-called “social signals”, and link that refer to yours from other sites count as an indication that good, relevant content is hidden here.

But it’s actually about not only being visible “for Google”, but for people. He should be given the opportunity to discover you in as many places as possible. And you can assume: If the reference to your websites and offers at a certain point helps real Internet users, both people and machines will be happy.

Also Read : What Are Search Engine Result Pages?