With improvements in the digital sphere and the convenience that completing tasks on the Internet brings, many consumers prefer to shop or communicate with businesses online. This is something that you can use to your advantage as a business owner. If you can get it right, your online presence has the potential to reach the entire world, rather than just your local area! Operating online also means fewer costs than those that are incurred by running a town center store or a big corporate headquarters. Identify Your Niche When you are taking your business online, the first thing you need to decide is who your customer base is. This may need to be quite a narrow niche in order for you to really resonate with them, but thats OK, you are speaking to the entire world after all! For example, if you are a clothing store, just speaking to people who wear clothing isnt enough. There are hundreds of other companies vying for their attention. You need to give them a reason why they personally should prefer to shop with you. You can do this by having a specialist product, or by having a really compelling story. For example, companies who use their business to help a charity are likely to do well with the people who already donate to that charity or feel aligned with its cause. Write Genuinely Engaging Content The next thing you need to do is not only to get people to your site, but to get them to keep coming back. The best way to do both of these things is to fill your website with engaging content that is both genuinely useful to the reader, and highly relevant to your niche. When Google is deciding which websites should come first in the search results, it looks for those who are most relevant to the search term (among other things). If your whole website is full of content related to that search it makes you much more relevant than if you have just one article about it, because it makes you look like an expert. The second reason is that if you are regularly posting content that your readership is enjoying or find useful, then they will keep coming back because they like what you have to say! Impress People Who Have An Audience This is a strategy that works to get you ranked on Google because if reputable websites are mentioning your site on theirs, Google will know that you are a trusted site and it is more likely to send you to the top of the results. For example, if you were creating an online bingo site then you might contact bingositesreviewer.com to see if they would include you on their site. They have their own reputation to uphold so they are only likely to mention you if they thought you were actually a quality site, so its important to put the work in. Use Social Media Use social media channels to build a community and keep a conversation going about your business and what you are doing. If done right, social media is a powerful tool. User Experience Is Key Ensure that your site is user friendly and tuned to your intended audience. For example, if you are trying to sell to people who are not very technical then a complicated website wont go down well!