It is curious and almost philosophical to see how time and, above all, technology, are capable of changing concepts and even the meaning of words. A few decades ago, talking about “presence” only presupposed someone who was physically somewhere.

Today, the term presence is no longer just associated with the concept of space and even space, its definition has been broadened. When we talk about digital presence, the range of possibilities takes on even greater dimensions.

Therefore, our purpose is for you to understand what digital presence is, the importance it assumes in the contemporary world and what needs to be done for your company to make an adequate presence in order to reap good results from this work.

What is a digital presence?

The keyword, which is decisive in understanding what this “type” of presence is, in the digital world. We recently discussed what digital transformation is and how it has impacted people and companies and even history. Similarly, digital presence occurs when using digital media to mark your presence. Does it look abstract? Soon you will see that it is not! On the contrary, it is very concrete and simple.

Briefly and for the purpose of our chat, digital media are all those who use electronic devices and the Internet to display information and carry out communication between two or more parties. It starts with two of the oldest devices that are part of our daily lives, which are the TV and the phone – both today digital – and goes through other devices, such as the notebook, the tablet, the smart TV, among others.

Today, the ways in which we all have information and establish communication with other people and companies are the most diverse, thanks to the many electronic devices that make it possible to connect with other devices, using different applications, such as Internet browsers, apps messaging (WhatsApp, Skype, etc.), email managers (MS Outlook, Eudora, Thunderbird, etc.), all of them are digital.

Thus, it can be said that digital presence means using the digital means available to carry information, communicate and provide products and services and relate to the world and the world. Simple, isn’t it?

The importance of the digital presence

It is said that children nowadays already come with a manual that is built in the factory because it is very natural how they handle digital devices, as well as using all the applications embedded in them. It even seems that it is simpler and more attractive for many to use this whole apparatus, than the simple act of speaking.

This integration of digital media in the way people interact with each other has been seen with equal intensity in the way these same people relate to companies and thus, those who are able to extend their performance and communication through all alternatives available will certainly have an important competitive advantage over companies that use only traditional means.

It is well known that traditional media, such as printed media, have had less and less penetration, generally restricted to audiences of older age groups and even in these segments, they have lost followers, not without reason, after all, digital media enable a very rich experience for both sides.

So, if in the past companies used television, newspaper and magazine advertising, direct mail, telemarketing and even the telephone directory to communicate with their customers, today those who have no website, blog, social networks, e-commerce, e-mail marketing, at the very least are moving towards isolation.

Making a digital presence is no longer just an option or a way of doing business and working. It is a necessity and at some point and in some niche markets, it will be the only way to exist.

How to make a company present digitally?

Can you just react to everything your neighbours and competitors are doing and rush to make a website, blog and email marketing campaign? Yes, you can! Will it have good results? Probably not! You may be wondering, but why? What do I have to do to succeed?

It seems easy and in part, it is not really a seven-headed thing to make a digital presence, but like everything or most things in a company, it requires a little work, a little knowledge, experience and planning, so that the results are satisfactory and compensate for everything you will dedicate and invest.

But don’t be alarmed, because the dedication and necessary investments are within the reach of the majority and because after all there is nothing that falls from the sky without any effort.

If you – and your company – do not yet have a digital presence, it is almost certain that you do not have the necessary knowledge and in this case, what is recommended is to seek professional help. There are professionals working in the Digital Marketing area, who are the most qualified to help you with this task.

But let’s say your company is very modest and what you have to invest is very little. In this case, start slowly. Do not want to embrace the world and stay aligned with the maxim that it is better to do the basics very well than to want to do everything, without knowing how and in the end, having nothing.

Therefore, we have prepared a roadmap of actions that you can develop and that will make your digital presence gradually expand, step by step.

Actions to develop a digital presence

First of all, it is important that if you cannot count on professional help to implement each step, the choice of what to do and how to do it must be well reflected, studied and planned. Talk to others who have had similar challenges. Learning from the mistakes of others helps to avoid headaches. Humility and down to earth matter too.

Many service providers, which will be necessary, such as a hosting company, can be decisive when implementing them. Therefore, look for information, such as the technical support that is offered, the types of hosting available and how to choose a hosting provider for digital services.

So keep in mind that part of the results you will reap depends on being around good service providers. Some act in a more supportive way than others and can decisively influence the results obtained and the ease or difficulty encountered along the way.

Website Creation

Currently, it is the minimum that is expected of a company that wants to have a digital presence, it is an institutional website. In fact, it is much less than would be necessary, but it is a start, after all, the search for suppliers of products or services is unlikely to come up against the search for websites of companies that provide them.

A well-designed institutional website can be an important channel for attracting new customers. In addition, it can also be another communication alternative, if not the main one, since many people currently search the companies’ websites when they want some form of contact, surpassing even the traditional telephone route.

Through this digital medium, the company can provide information about its history, industry, details and characteristics of its products and services, launches, offers, important communications, commercial information, among other possibilities. If your company doesn’t have that, a potential customer will certainly find everything you should have, but on a competitor’s website.

Maintaining a blog

Many people think that a website and a blog are equivalent or that one can replace the other. In very specific cases, it is even permissible for this to happen, but if there is a possibility of counting on both, it is the most suitable.

We have prepared for you, a complete article that deals with the importance of maintaining a blog, but if you want a summary of the main reasons, a blog, in general, generates more engagement from people – and customers – who at some level relate to your company. Due to the dynamic nature of the content, the same person will access the blog more often than an institutional website, attracted by the new content that your company produces to feed you. Readout step by step guide to creating a free blog.

Among some of the benefits you will have, you can improve branding work, contribute to improve communication, help with SEO, make your products and services better known and another series of advantages that may vary with the nature, resources and content of the blog.

Basically, you have to keep in mind that an institutional website concentrates static information or that changes little over time. A blog, on the other hand, has dynamic content, which grows constantly and must be attractive, in a way that adds value to the company, its image, its products and services.

Social networks

The name itself indicates the main nature of this type of action, which is to socialize or to bring people into society with common goals, ideas and expectations. It is also currently an important communication channel, if not one of the main ones.

Due to the characteristics of each social network, when the company chooses to participate in one – or several – it can develop personalized actions or geared towards specific people and objectives and thus exercise better quality communication, focused on specific niches and, above all, more dynamics.

Other extremely attractive points when choosing to use/participate in social media are:

  • Informality – the informal character of a social network, allows for a more popular, simpler and at the same time closer communication to the realities of each participant, as well as more humanized;
  • Communication – the interactivity that characterizes social networks, favours richer communication, as well as the collection of information from its audience, which is also its consuming public and its prospects. In addition, people generally feel more comfortable expressing their ideas on social media;
  • Maintenance and cost – due to the infrastructure and technology being provided by those who maintain the social network, the work lies only in producing content and updating it;
  • Popularity – the number of people using social networks, as well as the time they stay connected daily, is a factor that favours that the content you produce, be seen and shared more intensely;
  • Knowledge – to the same extent as improving communication, the participation of people on your page, allows you to obtain information from your audience that you would hardly have used from other media;

As in the case of the blog, we must emphasize that social media do not replace institutional sites or blogs, first because the types of content of each of the three have their particularities, second because the proposals are different and third, because in the case of social media, the usage policies are determined by who controls the network and you do not have total freedom as you have in the case of the website and blog.

E-commerce

When it is opportune and what you sell allows, considering the creation of an e-commerce site or virtual store, it is something that can be besides attractive, very commercially advantageous.

Among the main advantages of maintaining an online store are:

  • Cost – as there is no need for salespeople and in some cases, the infrastructure for marketing can be leaner than in physical stores, costs are lower;
  • Competitiveness – due to the lower cost, you also make your product more attractive and commercially competitive. Sometimes the lowest cost using this means, allows the cost of products to be reduced;
  • Coverage – unlike physical stores, where the coverage area is geographically restricted, e-commerce sites are unaware of borders. Your performance has no limits, as long as you have distribution channels that serve everywhere;
  • Communication and information – in addition to being an additional channel for communication, website navigation is an important component to feed the company with consumer behaviour, insofar as it is possible to know which items have generated interest in consumers, according to navigation;

This is already the fourth type of activity that a company can perform on the Internet and that does not replace any of the previous three. When it is possible and opportune, one can have the four means and thus exercise a more striking presence and directed to the purposes and needs of the company, as well as naturally meeting the different demands of its potential customers.

E-mail marketing

Almost as much as a document such as CPF or RG, everyone who today uses the Internet or works in a company, has an email address or e-mail. There are those who do not participate in a social network, there are those who do not have a website or blog, there are even those who do not use WhatsApp, but it is really difficult to find someone who does not have an email. There are those who have more than one and there are those who have several.

And it is because of this characteristic that there is possibly still no way to have such a wide reach as E-mail Marketing. However, it is important to highlight that when we refer to reach, it is not in the sense of effectiveness in the results, but how many people we can reach regardless of whether the result is positive or not.

From the principle that E-mail Marketing is done within correctness, ethics and well-defined standards, it is a good way to act in order to increase the digital presence.

If used for purposes more oriented to corporate and institutional communication, as occurs for example in the sending of newsletters, it is a tool that still produces an appreciable use.

SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

Search engine optimization, or simply SEO, is certainly one of the most important actions when thinking about real and efficient digital presence. Why? Because the Internet is very wide, there is a lot of content and if your content is not worked properly, search engines and in particular Google search, will not display it properly in the results.

There is no point in having fantastic content if you do not appear in the world. A significant part of the work consists of positioning your site, your blog and whatever else you have, in Google’s organic results, and for that, there are people and companies specialized in doing this work, which must be continuous and have a total relationship with the production of content for your media.

This is a broad and complex subject and, therefore, it is not our intention to go much further on a simple topic. Structured and well-designed work is recommended in order to have the results that are possible and important.

Mobile Presence

Among all the aspects that contributed to the expansion of the Internet in recent years, one has a special highlight – accesses via mobile devices, predominantly through smartphones and to a lesser extent, tablets.

Therefore, it is essential that websites, blogs or whatever is created for the Internet, be responsive and, therefore, automatically adaptable for mobile viewing or on mobile devices.

Another way to expand participation and presence in the development of apps for this class of devices. A practical and popular example of a smartphone app that integrates users with small businesses is disk pizza apps. However, there are many small companies that manage to develop apps that integrate their products and services to their customers, through the convenience and ease that an application can provide and at the same time are generating contact and loyalty.

Other ways to make a presence digitally

The matter does not end here. Above we list the main, simplest and most important initiatives, assuming that if you are here, it is probably because you did not do any of this or if you did, it was not in the proper way or who knows precariously.

Remember that before you become sophisticated or even take longer steps, it is important to have the conviction that the basics must be very well done, after all, there is no point in creating a powerful email marketing campaign and when the audience accesses your website. , finds inappropriate content or your hosting plan is not able to support greater demand for access.

Conclusion

Acting in the sense of making a digital presence on the part of small companies, requires an understanding of its importance, the results that can be obtained, how things should be done and, above all, the need that this represents today. It is something that can be simple and accessible, but it requires seriousness and professionalism, like all other actions within the organizational environment.