The answer to are microsites effective for small business marketing campaigns, is YES – they are extremely effective. I speak from personal experience. My business really took off once I created a few quality microsites.
In fact, depending on your business, microsites may be necessary for an effective marketing campaign. They are critical to my small business.
What are microsites?
Microsites are synonymous with mini sites. You’ll see the terms used interchangeably.
I explain what are microsites in detail here.
My experience with microsites for my small business
My first foray into marketing my small business online was building 1 website for all the services I offered.
Using only 1 website was a failure for all my services except 1. My business offers 3 distinct services within my field.
The trouble I found relying on 1 website for my entire business is the website didn’t cater to specific prospective clients. Clients looking for service A were not looking for service B. They were distinct.
I was faced with 2 options:
- Stop offering 2 of my 3 services; or
- Build microsites for each service I offer.
I opted to build microsites for each service I offer. Using microsites was one of the best business decisions I ever made. The result 20 months later is a huge increase in business in all 3 services I offer.
Why are microsites effective?
There are several reasons microsites are effective. They are as follows:
- Conversion: you appear as the authority/expert/focused on the specific service/product offered.
- SEO: your website is dedicated to a specific service/product/location that can rank well in the search engines.
- Build an asset: Web properties are assets. Your microsites could be sold down the road if they generate business.
Should your business use microsites?
It really depends on your business. If you offer 1 service or sell 1 product or a very similar line of products, then microsites likely aren’t the best use of your resources.
However, if you offer distinct services or various product lines, then microsites can be extremely effective.
The best way to illustrate whether microsites can be effective for your business is to set out a series of examples of businesses and related microsite topics.
1. Accountants
An accountant that offers only personal income tax preparation services probably wouldn’t benefit greatly from microsites.
An accountant that offers business consulting, personal income tax preparation, and small business corporate tax preparation would benefit from 3 microsites on each service offered.
2. Yoga Studios
A yoga studio that offers only hatha yoga probably wouldn’t benefit much from microsites.
However, a yoga studio business that offers hatha yoga classes and offers teacher training could benefit by having 2 distinct websites.
3. Restaurants
I don’t think microsites are great fit for restaurants unless they have a catering service or some other distinct service from being a restaurant.
4. Mechanics
Mechanics are ripe for microsites, especially if they offer a variety of services such as auto body repair, oil changes, muffler and exhaust work, etc.
5. Electricians (and other trades)
This depends on whether they serve distinct customers. If they serve both commercial and residential premises, that would be a basis for microsites.
You get the idea. Please note that this list of examples is not anywhere near exhaustive. It’s for illustrative purposes only.
My litmus test for whether a microsite would be effective for your business
Ask the following questions:
- Do you offer distinct services/products? If yes, microsites are a good idea.
- Do you offer a service/product to distinct customers? The electrician example above is an example of this. If yes, a microsite is a good idea.
- Do you serve multiple geographic locations? Maybe. It’s worth testing. See below.
What about businesses with multiple locations?
Should a business with multiple locations create microsites for each location?
This is an excellent question and the answer is maybe. My business serves 6 geographic locations from 2 offices. I do NOT create microsites for each location. Instead, I built microsites based on distinct services.
What I do is optimize my microsites on different pages and posts for each location. However, I suspect building microsites based on location may well benefit my business.
The fact is my prospective clients search for my services locally. Although I rank well in the search engines for all the geographic locations I serve, I suspect I could rank well with location-specific microsites.
If building microsites based on geographic location appeals to you, test it. Build one and see what happens.
Should a business also have 1 main website setting out all services and/or products?
This is a personal or business decision. For my business, I do NOT have a website listing all of our services. This type of website, when a business has microsites, I call the “umbrella” website.
The reason I chose not to create an umbrella website for my business is I want prospective clients looking for a distinct service to only find the appropriate microsite. I don’t want them to also find an umbrella site showing I offer other services. In my view the umbrella site would detract from the appearance of my firm’s expertise in a particular area.
Please keep in mind that since I don’t have an umbrella website, I haven’t tested my theory. The fact is not having an umbrella website is working tremendously well and I don’t wish to upset that success.
What if you already have an umbrella website?
As I said above, I did have 1 umbrella website once upon a time. I simply converted it to a website featuring a specific service.
That said, if having an umbrella site for branding is important to you, then by all means keep it and then add umbrella websites.
When is an umbrella site a good idea?
If your customers and clients use more than 1 service or buy more than 1 type of product from you, then an umbrella site is important. If, on the other hand your customers/clients will only use a distinct service or product, then an umbrella site is not terribly important.
For example, our same accountant with 3 services above may be well-served with an umbrella site because business clients would use both consulting and business tax preparation.
Another good reason to use an umbrella website is if the fact you offer a diverse service/product offering is an attractive element to your customers and clients, then an umbrella website is a good idea. In my business, the fact I offer distinct services is not a selling element. In other words, clients hiring me for service A are not impressed because I also offer service B.
How to choose a domain name for a microsite?
I wrote an extensive tutorial on choosing domain names for microsites here.
For my business, each microsite’s domain name is a keyword rather than using my business name. I did this for 3 reasons:
- I wanted to use the domain name and URL to help rank in the search engines. It’s clear to me, based on my experience, that a domain name can help greatly with ranking for the keyword in the domain name.
- I wanted to create a Web property that could be sold to a competitor. A keyword-based domain name can be used by any of my competitors. A keyword that includes my business name is not very saleable (Unless they do a 301 redirect, which may hamper a top-value sale).
- A domain name specific to a service gives emphasizes that I do in fact offer those services and am an expert in those services.
What about branding?
I preferred creating microsites that are easily saleable. However, if you’re intent on branding your business name, then include your business name with your service/product keyword. Returning to an accountant example. If the accounting firm is called Smith Accounting – the domain could be www.smithpersonalincometaxes.com.
If you build microsites for geographic areas, you definitely want the geographic area in the domain name. For our accountant example in Omaha, the domain could be www.omahapersonalincometaxes.com.
Should your microsites use the same design as your umbrella site or other microsites?
It’s not necessary. My microsites have different designs. However, if you’re looking to brand your business as a whole, you’ll probably want to incorporate similar designs and use the same logo in each site.
If your logo has a generalized tag line for your business, you might want to change your tag lines for each microsite.
For example, if an accountant offers personal income tax preparation, business consulting, and small business tax preparation, each microsite for those services will want a tag line that specifies those services.
Microsite cautions
Admittedly not every microsite I’ve built for my business is as successful as others. I built numerous microsites for testing purposes. The microsites that I don’t build up with a lot of content don’t generate as much business as my larger microsites. That said, several microsites I built took less than an afternoon and do deliver some business so they are still worth it.
1. Do NOT build microsites if you’re not committed to building them up and promoting them.
The fact is every website requires attention on an ongoing business. The microsites I focus on generate by far the most business for me.
By giving attention, I don’t necessarily mean publishing a lot of content, although quality content is good.
Your microsite could be a highly-converting landing page to which you drive traffic to from non organic SEO methods (for ways to drive traffic to a website, read my 57 Ways to Increase Website Traffic).
2. Also, and this is IMPORTANT, do not publish the same content among your sites.
Each microsite I publish contains unique content specifically created for each site.
Do not ignore the effectiveness of websites with a lot of content. In my experience, my larger sites rank better in the search engines. Create microsites only if you can build them up or drive traffic to them with non-organic SEO methods.
Microsite best practices – how to build an effective microsite?
1. Have a distinct purpose for your microsite
Be sure the content is specific to the distinct service or product your website is about. The more detailed and specific, the better. You want to appear as an authority for that service or product offering.
2. Do your keyword research first
I write about keyword research for microsites here.
3. You must promote your microsite
If you don’t promote your microsite and attract targeted traffic, your microsite will not work for you. Read my 57 Ways to Increase Website Traffic for website promotion ideas.
4. Don’t spread yourself too thin
It’s easy to get really excited about the prospect of a huge number of microsites. However, you must promote each site regularly. If you build too many sites too quickly, you won’t be able to adequately promote any of your microsites. It’s better to have 2 or 3 effective microsites than 10 that generate no business.
5. Choose a domain name with keywords rather than your business name.
You could include your keyword along with your business name for branding. I don’t do this, but if you’re keen on branding your name, then that could be a good solution.
Should your Microsites include a blog?
Mine do and I blog on them regularly.
It depends on the purpose of your microsite. Is it a landing page only designed to convert website visitors to customers and clients?
Or is it a more traditional website with a home page that you will develop into a stand-alone website? If so, a blog is an excellent fit.
Are microsites bad for SEO?
No, not in my experience. I had a concern about this when building my microsites, but it’s proven quite the opposite. My microsites attract targeted customers.
The key is that your microsites be unique in content and who they serve. Search engines want to produce the best search results for searches. In my view, microsites are an excellent search result for applicable search terms because they cater to that search specifically.
What if your first website cost a lot of money and you don’t want to spend that much on additional websites?
If you had your first business website built and it cost you a lot of money, your microsite need not cost that much.
If you’re prepared to build your own website (read my pros of cons of building your own website here), then you can do it cheaply.
Alternatively, your web designer may give you a discounted rate to create additional sites because the design is done.
It’s true that building additional sites may cost you more money, but if it generates more business than you’re getting now, it could well be worth the investment.
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