It is true that the Internet has democratised access to online business.
Today, anyone with minimal digital skills can at least have access to having its own website and start selling your products or services.
Well, selling is a big word, but at least you can try.
I am fortunate to spend the day and work with people who have very good ideas (and intentions) and I am very happy to work with them. fascinated by the confusion that still exists around digital business. and the Internet.
The lack of foresight, improvisation and lack of consistency of these businesses is truly scandalous.
And for a reason of strange luck, something that any entrepreneur would never build in the offline worldThe Committee believes that it should do so in the digital environment.
Why does this happen, why does someone at a certain point in their life execute that "I want to set up something online"?
I think there are many reasons why this happens, but I see three key reasons, and one very important one.
- We believe we have a very good service / product. novelbut we have never checked it.
- We believe it is simple. All you have to do is make a website and publish on social media.
- We believe that it is not necessary (or even contemplated) to allocate an annual marketing budget and we assume that Internet is cheap (this is the main reason I was talking about).
And this, dear reader, is the explosive mixture that incites any mortal to build an Internet business.
If we add to this the courses of all the smoke peddlers that circulate on the Internet, we have the perfect storm to arrive home at night with tons of frustration.
This content aims to avoid just that.
Or, at least, I hope if you are thinking of starting an online business, you know at the outset what you are really getting into and get this idea out of your head that with 5 euros a day on Facebook you are going to sell something or that your cousin from the village makes you SEO for 200 euros a month.
If that were the case, we'd all be millionaires selling what-ifs on Instagram.
Digital business is tough, complex, highly competitive and, yes, cost a lot more money than you think.
After more than 10 years of experience and analysing proposals of all types and in all sectors, I have identified 5 reasons why this type of business should not be launched.
I will get to it.
1. No business or digital marketing plan
Of course, I don't believe that a company should have to have a business plan beyond three years and an online marketing plan beyond 6 months.
But there must be something in it.
What cannot happen is that someone has an idea in his head and throws it into the void because he can set up a website in an afternoon.
This happens on a daily basis.
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There has to be a way forward open (and more so online) to flexibility and pivoting; but there has to be a way forward.
In this regard, it will be necessary to have the sufficient expertise and resources to be able to take it seriously.
2. You have not defined these three areas of the project
To summarise a lot (especially in small projects it works well), there are three areas that need to be well thought out before you can jump into the digital jungle.
- Technology.
- Brand.
- Tactics.
Understand me, you don't have to be Apple (you don't have to be); but a business website has to work with all the excellence possible to compete with the rest of the players from the first day of launch.
This means that, at technological level, your company's shop window has to be perfect, well cared for and well thought out (it is thought out before and not after launching it).
In relation to the brandI also encounter a lot of problems in the day-to-day running of the agency.
Companies that do not know what they are, that lack discourse, who want to be several things at the same time. In short, they have neither a brand discourse nor a clear competitive advantage.
On the other hand, it is necessary to define a strategy on the brand discourse and to choose the channels on the level of the brand. tactical.
If at least these three areas do not exist in the project, you don't have a project.
3. You do not have a specialised marketing team
Let's see.
Either you launch a digital business well or you don't launch it at all.
A truly digital business is transversal, omnichannelThe project is data-driven, data-based and multidisciplinary.
This means that in reality, even if you can't or don't want to pay for it, you're going to need a marketing team to work in all areas required by a digital business.
Content, SEO, SEM, analytics, data, CRM, email, development, social, creativity...
Sound familiar? Well, one person alone can't do it.
Count on it before jumping into the digital void.
4. You don't have a budget or you think it's cheap
This is one of the main problems we encounter.
The 90% of this type of business (of course I am not referring to large companies) has not budgeted its marketing spend for launching and maintaining its business.
Others believe they will selling its novel product en masse from day 1 of launch by investing a ridiculous amount in advertising.
Let me be clear.
Advertising, creativity, SEO, data analysis, strategic proposals and their execution. are not cheap. And if you don't have a defined budget to support the start-up of your business, my recommendation is that you don't execute it.
You will save a lot of money and unnecessary headaches.
5. You don't base your decisions on data and you think too much.
Decision-making needs to be data-drivennot on intuition or opinion.
I say opinions and not by experimentation or A/B testing.
From keywords to copies in advertisements; through creatives or layouts of elements on a web page.
Don't give your opinion without data.
Launch hypotheses instead of opinions and verify them to move forward or get rid of them; but always focused on achieving a continuous process of improvement for your business.
