Building A Strong Online Presence Part 1: Foundations
Successful online marketing depends on a strong online presence— and that requires a solid foundation. This is a three-part series on how to grow your brand’s online presence from the ground up. Here is part one with everything you need to know to give your website firm roots.
Successful Online Marketing: Start with Your Website
All your digital marketing should start and end with your website. Think of it as your home base for your online branding operations. When Google and Social Media have done their job attracting the right eyeballs to your brand, they need to send those prospects to a place where they can find out more (and convert😉).
But just like building a brick-and-mortar home, you need certain elements you cannot go without. And getting them wrong will have devasting long-term effects.
Domain and Hosting Fundamentals (Picking the Right Address)
Your domain refers to the computer servers that house your website and email files. And hosting refers to where those servers are kept and maintained.
Before you can lay a single brick, you need to decide two things:
- What is going to be the best address for your brand? This is your domain name.
- Are you going to rent or own the land that you build on? This is how your domain is hosted.
Picking a Hosting Provider
As your business grows, your email users and website, too. So, you’ll need lots of server space. You also want top-quality equipment (servers) for your precious data. This is why most businesses choose a hosting provider (instead of buying and maintaining their own servers).
Because you never know when an emergency will strike, you need a provider that is:
- Accessible and offers support 24/7.
- Hosts their servers locally (in South Africa).
While price is an important factor, it’s unwise to pick the provider with the best price for your current needs. Remember your goal is to grow your online presence. See how their pricing escalates for bigger packages.
Read the terms and conditions carefully to see that you are comfortable with.
- Their support turn-around times.
- How they protect and maintain their equipment.
- Their cancellation and data migration policy.
Many hosting providers offer domain registration too, but they register the domain in their name and, therefore, “own” it. If you ever want to leave them, you might have to register a new domain and start building your online presence again from scratch.
Choosing the Best Domain Name
Your domain name is like an address telling other computers where to find your website. It forms part of a complete web address, called a URL, which looks like this:
www.[domain name].com
It is what users will type into search or address bars to reach you—so it’s crucial to choose the right name!
Tips for choosing your domain name:
- Make it memorable by keeping it short yet descriptive. This is why business names usually work.
- Keep it simple. Special characters, double letters, hyphens, and sometimes puns don’t generally translate well into web addresses. If your business name has these qualities, consider a different domain name.
- Look out for unexpected double meanings. Type out your desired domain name and see how it works in URLs and email addresses. A famous example is American Scrap Metal, which, unfortunately, reads americanscrapmetal.com
- Come up with a few options. There’s a chance the domain you want is already taken, so have some backups. You can check if it is used by simply typing in Google. Or search it on .com If it is parked or reserved, there’s a chance you can still get your hands on it—ask us how.
- Play with the top-level domain. A URL’s “.com” part identifies the top-level domain and is part of the domain name. If what you want is taken in .com, it might be available in .co.za or .net or .io. The domain name checkers will include these options.
Online Brand Reputation Relies on Fast Response
Technology is not guaranteed to work 100% of the time. Things can occasionally go wrong, but how you respond to a website glitch or emails going down will make all the difference to preserving your online reputation .
Here’s an exclusive Famous Digital Media tip: ensure you always have at least one developer with back-end and C-panel access available. You can arrange this through your hosting provider, or you may employ a full-time developer—they are essential either way!
Trust the Professionals
With a brick-and-mortar building, it’s unlikely that you would tackle title deeds, transfers, architecture and construction by yourself. Yet many businesses try to keep these digital functions in-house. Finding the right professionals lets you leverage their expertise and reach your goals faster. It also places accountability in the right hands.