Bringing Your Business Online

We are going through some surreal and difficult times. Nationwide, COVID-19 is turning life as we know it upside down (and then shaking the hell out of it). This is hitting small brick & mortar businesses especially hard. In an effort to slow the spread of this virus, retail shops, restaurants, service based businesses, and other “non-essential” venues are being told to shut their doors to the public. Before the internet, this would have been the absolute death of a business. Luckily, we can take our wares and services to the onlines! Here are 5 tips to bring your business online:

Make sure you’ve got a working website –

E-commerce is about to be more relevant and necessary than ever before. If your business doesn’t have a platform to sell, it’s time to consider making that a reality. A very important part of starting up a site is purchasing your domain name YOURSELF. We cannot stress that enough and wrote an article that can answer some questions about that. Need help with building your site? Let us help you with that: click here to learn more.
Take your business to social media –

People are stuck at home and mindlessly thumbing through social media like it’s going out of style. You want to make your posts bright and bold to stop people in their endless scrolling. Make your product or your service relatable. And it’s not all about sell sell sell. Share a funny picture or two. Make a meme about your product. Reach out to your audience and get them to interact with you. Need help with that? We’ve got you covered. Want to do it on your own? We get it! Here’s an article we wrote to help.
Gift cards –

Is your business service related? If so, this is especially relevant to you. You can still make revenue while on lockdown by offering gift cards on your site. Gift cards put money in your account now, give people who are cooped up something to look forward to later, and don’t require any effort or overhead. This is helpful for ALL businesses, from restaurants to retail to services like spas and physical therapists. See how we’re helping small businesses by purchasing gift cards with our Burg Biz Care Package.
Get involved with the community –

Quarantine and social distancing have some people going stir crazy. Talk online with people and other small businesses in the community. Make your presence and your voice known. Offer support where you can. Record a video or go live on Facebook and talk about your business and your role in the community. Doing this is not only good for the soul, it can also reveal a need that you may be able to fill or give you an idea that can launch you in a new direction.
Put on a happy face –

We know. It’s HARD. But try to stay as positive as possible. Doom and gloom won’t sell anything and it certainly won’t make you feel better to wallow. Keep your chin up to help others lift their spirits. And if your mental health is taking a toll, please know that you’re not alone. Running a business is hard enough as is (see our article BEFORE this mess)… don’t forget to take care of YOU.

We’re all in this together. As always, if you have any questions about moving your business online or marketing or action figures or hockey, please email us at info@metronovacreative.com