The goal for any business is to stand out online against competitors in what is often a crowded market. There may be various reasons why you wish to stand out but if we consider the real desired result, it is almost without exception profit driven. The designer has been appointed to help the business increase sales and this should never be far from the mind of everyone on the design team.
Four ways we can improve profitability are:
- increase online spend per head
- increase offline spend in physical locations
- attract new customers
- attract exciting customers to new products or services
Achieving the right balance of aesthetics, content and by telling your story can be an effective strategy for making your business stand out online.
Aesthetics
Your brand needs to look and function seamlessly online. Your audience will interact with your brand via different mediums – from reading a newsletter on their mobile phone to watching a video on a tablet through to making a purchasing decision on your website using a large desktop display.
Your brand needs to look fantastic, be easily recognisable, work seamlessly and deliver a rich and engaging experience regardless of the medium.
Consider the design and layout of your website – has it been designed to deliver impact, impress the user with enticing imagery, thought-provoking headlines and structured articles that make your brand immediately recognisable as yours?
Content
Content is one of the most important aspects of an online business and is what makes an impact and creates a buying decision. Your content needs to be well researched, planned, concise and created for your target audience.
To stand out from competitors you need to make sure your content is fresh, engaging, relevant and most importantly unique. Creating unique quality content takes time but it is a clear way to make you stand out. Consider your tone of voice – do you want to be seen a serious, humorous, factual or a combination? Can you educate the audience and offer them in-depth knowledge your competitors can’t?
Videos command a huge percentage of web traffic and are excellent for search rankings. Consider having a professional video created that showcases your products or services that can be embedded on your website and shared across social media platforms – make sure videos are branded and clearly recognised as yours.
Your Story
Every business has a story – by telling yours you can show how passionate you are about your work and the products and services you offer. Your story will be unique to you so this is the key driver in differentiating your business and standing out. Make sure you clearly define whats different about your business and talk about it – is it the history, the knowledge, the fun and friendly side of the team or is it that you offer a level of service that is far superior to that of your closest competitor? Whatever it is, you need to make sure your audience understands its an integral part of your business.
A business that stands out online is likely to generate more sales
A business that stands out online in our experience sees more repeat and new visitors per month.
The combination of a professionally designed brand, an interesting company story, unique and engaging content strategy which is promoted to the correct audience and is backed up with a clearly defined
A coordinated and well-executed brand strategy reassures new and existing customers to engage with your brand online more.
There is no one hard and fast rule that will work for every business, but at Fruition we work to the above principles applying an individual approach to each new client depending on the needs and aspirations of their business.
If you would be interested in seeing some examples of how our clients have benefited from this approach please visit our contact page for details on how to get in touch for confidential no obligation discussion.
