Digital marketing is constantly changing, but one thing remains the same…Digital marketing is like an ugly holiday sweater. Read on to find out more!
If there is one thing we’ve learned in our umpteen years in marketing, it is that digital marketing is a lot like an ugly holiday sweater…One size does not fit all.
Just as a company’s industry and goals can affect the marketing strategy, marketing methods are often different for enterprise businesses vs small and medium-sized businesses.
Before we dive into the differences between marketing for enterprises vs small and medium sized businesses, let’s talk about some similarities.
Enterprise Marketing vs Small/Medium-Sized Business Marketing: Similarities
Content Marketing
Regardless of the size of your business, fresh, targeted content is an essential part of expanding your online presence. Search engines love new content, and regular blog posts help establish your business as an authority in your industry.
Not only does content marketing enable your website to appear in more searches, but it also provides opportunities for internal linking. Linking your content to relevant service pages on your site helps build the authority of those pages, which in turn improves the ranking of those pages.
Rich Snippets
Have you ever typed a question into Google and received a small blurb with the answer to your question at the top of the page? That little blurb is called a “Rich Snippet”.
Rich snippets are particularly powerful because they are listed before other search results, meaning people will see your information (with a link to your site) before other search results.
While there is no guaranteed method to get your content to appear as a rich snippet, we have had a lot of success with producing authoritative, properly-formatted content that is selected by Google to appear as a rich snippet.
Business Reviews
According to the Local Consumer Review Survey 2020 from BrightLocal, “87% of consumers read online reviews for local businesses in 2020”. This is up from 81% in 2019, and this trend is only expected to continue.
Successful businesses, regardless of size, understand that reviews can make or break their business. At New Plains MediaMedia, we help businesses manage reviews by finding the reviews that are out there, addressing negative reviews, and collecting new reviews from satisfied customers.
Video Marketing
When it comes to a comprehensive marketing strategy, the importance of video marketing cannot be overlooked. As research from Google has shown, over 90% of people say they discover new brands or products on YouTube, and more than half of shoppers say online video has helped them decide which specific brand or product to buy.
Businesses, both large and small, are taking advantage of video marketing to increase brand awareness, inform consumers, and broaden their reach on the internet.
Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Advertising
Pay-Per-Click (PPC) advertising has a number of benefits that make it a great addition to a marketing strategy, regardless of the size of the business.
When you search in Google, ads are displayed above the regular search results, which can level the playing field for smaller sites and newer businesses.
PPC advertising also makes it possible to fill gaps for keyword groups for which we do not have organic visibility and enables us to get quick wins while spinning up organic campaigns, which take more time to achieve visibility gains.
Plus, since you’re only charged a fee when a visitor actually clicks on your ad, it is a good way maximize your marketing dollars.
Enterprise Marketing vs Small/Medium-Sized Business Marketing: Differences
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Search engine optimization (SEO) helps your website rank higher and appear more often in Internet searches by prospective customers. Although SEO is a must-have for every website, the methods and scale can be vastly different for enterprise business sites.
Whereas smaller businesses may be focused on a few products and services for a single geographic location, enterprise businesses often have multiple locations and significantly more products and services. This dramatically changes the scope and goals of the search engine optimization strategy.
Site Architecture
Just as search engine optimization is more complex for enterprise businesses, site architecture is also affected by the size of the business and the number of products and services offered.
This is especially true when it comes to eCommerce sites. Not only does your site need to be structured in an easy-to-navigate way to improve the visitor experience, but it is essential that search engines can find and index every product.
Multi-Language Support
While small and medium-sized businesses may offer multiple languages on their websites, our enterprise clients are generally the ones that require multi-language support.
This goes above and beyond just having a “select a language” dropdown on the site. Proper multi-language support involves targeting specific URL’s, proper hreflang tag implementation, and other backend modifications to ensure that the user sees the correct content and search engines are able to index it properly.
Google My Business and Citation Management
A business citation is an online listing of your business information, often including the name, address, phone number, and other info. While there are countless business directories online, one of the most important is your Google My Business (GMB) listing.
Your GMB listing appears when people search for businesses like yours in Google Maps, one of the most popular map search engines. But, it also can appear in a “knowledge panel” when people search for your business in Google.
Every eligible business should have a fully optimized GMB listing, and all online citations should be identified and updated to include accurate information about the business. This is true, regardless of the size of the organization. However, citation management can be much more complicated for enterprise businesses.
Larger businesses often have multiple locations and departments within them that may also qualify for their own citations. Duplicates, gaps, and inaccurate information can present challenges for enterprise businesses who do not have a knowledgeable team that is dedicated to making sure this information is correct.
Digital Marketing for Businesses of Any Size
There are many components that go into building an effective digital marketing strategy. Many of the techniques apply to businesses of all sizes, while some need to be modified or scaled-up to be effective for enterprise businesses.
Regardless of the size of your company or the industries you serve, the marketing professionals at New Plains MediaMedia can design a comprehensive marketing strategy, tailored to your business.
