The internet can provide you with many different marketing opportunities. Having a strategic marketing campaign can help to identify opportunities and increase traffic which leads to website conversions. It is important to ensure that you are targeting not only the right market, but the most valuable leads for your business. Here are the top six things you should consider when looking for your ideal client.

Who is your ideal client?
This is one of the most important questions to ask yourself before you begin your online marketing. If your ideal client was to walk through your door today what would they look like and what are they looking for? When asking yourself this question, does a particular product or service come to mind? If so, then you want to make that product a campaign focus. Promote products and services that are popular and that you specialize in. That way you are bringing in valuable leads that are most likely to generate revenue for you.

What personality traits and interests do they have?
Many businesses ideal clients fall within a certain demographic. For example, if you are a plastic surgeon specializing in facelifts then generally your age demographic will be people between the ages of 40-65. Are your services considered luxury items or does a particular gender or culture use them more than others? If you answered yes to these questions then you want make sure you are marketing using services that can specifically target people by their profiles. Paid ads on Facebook and LinkedIn are a great example of ways that you can target prospects using information they filled out in a profile. Facebook allows you to target people based on age, location, income, education and hobbies while also allowing you to target them based on what they are talking about. LinkedIn can help you to target interest groups as well as business professionals who may be in industries who use your products or services often.

Think about your competition
In most cases you are not the only ones marketing online using the demographics mentioned above. Think about what your competition is doing and how you can make yourself stand out. For example, is it easy for a visitor to understand your business model? Are your products and services easy to find once they get to your website and do you offer competitive pricing? If so, then using services like paid search on Google can help you to showcase promotions right in the ad copy, therefore allowing you stand out on the Google search page. A sales funnel can help limit the click path a visitor has to take before they reach a conversion page, therefore making it easier and more efficient to find information about products and services or to purchase online.

Get information or buy now?
Depending on where your prospect is in the buying cycle you want to make sure you are marketing to both types of visitors. A visitor who is early in the sales cycle is generally looking for information and focused on competitive pricing. Search engine optimization can be the best way to market to this type of visitor because they could be using many different types of keywords to search, want to see many different types of sites and competitors and are generally not in a hurry to make a decision. 80% of all traffic can be found searching on the organic side of Google. Therefore you want to ensure your website is properly optimized so that the exact page that visitor is looking for comes up and is ranking high on Google. This type of visitor will generally not look past the second page for information. Paid search on Google generally attracts people with a buy now attitude. Using this type of marketing you can showcase products and services, promote discounts and savings and tell Google which page of your site you want a particular add to guide that visitor to. This helps limit the click path which is ideal for anyone who is ready to take action.

Are you on the map?
Do you prefer to do business locally? Does you ideal client? Google places is a great service for anyone whose business focus is local. By verifying your listing you can ensure that when people type in the city name, or the region where you are located you have a better change of showing up and being clicked on. Google places is also very effect for targeting people searching on their mobile phones because they may already be in the area when looking for a business. Google places can also help with Google page saturation ensuring visitors that you are the most relevant business for what they are searching for as well as helping with organic rankings.
Keep them coming back for more.

Take a look at the engagement statistics of your website. Are you finding that you are driving traffic to your website however not everyone decided to get in touch with you during that visit? Take advantage of marketing to visitors who may have been to your website before but didn’t convert. A remarketing campaign can help to promote your brand and remind people that have been to your website before to come back again.

Michelle Flynn works in Toronto, Canada as a Campaign Analyst at the Internet Marketing Firm TechWyse. You can read more of her work on the TechWyse blog Rise to the Top.