Table of Contents
This article is part of the school of coworking course through Archie. Make sure to check out the other articles to learn more about how to start a coworking space business.Â
Step 1: Start off with a great website
Before anything else, you need to make sure you have a good, easy-to-use website. There are many aspects that go into creating an appealing website experience for your customers. Some of which include knowing your brand, figuring out a budget, and of course, deciding which website building tools to use.
While creating an online presence through a website from scratch might sound very overwhelming, we developed a thorough step-by-step guide on how to build the perfect website for your coworking space.
Quick overview of the best website-building tools:
- Squarespace: Squarespace is a no-code website builder, but it is a little bit more restrictive in terms of what it allows you to do, however, many believe that it has the best templates and features out of all the website builders.
- Wix: Wix falls into the category of a no-code website builder and has already built-in templates for you to choose from. Wix and Squarespace are responsible for building 55% of all websites, and while they are similar, there are some differences that you want to understand
- WordPress: WordPress is the oldest website builder that exists, which is why it’s the most popular, powering more than 38% of all websites. Unlike Wix or Squarespace, WordPress is a CMS website builder that relies heavily on coding. To have a nice-looking website you must know how to code or hire someone to do so.
- Webflow: Webflow is a combination between a no-code website builder and a coded one. Although it is not as popular as the other web builders yet, it is definitely making its way. Webflow offers the best of both worlds when it comes to building and customizing your website.
For more in-depth overviews as well as pros and cons of every tool, click here.
Step 2: Learn and use SEO
SEO is one of the most important and powerful tools at your disposal if you want to optimize your website as much as possible. Although there is a lot that goes into it, it’s important to get started, especially if you regularly update your website with content.
SEO stands for search engine optimization. To put it in simple terms, Google has a search engine where you can search up a question for example, and an article or a website will pop up with the answer. Or you can scroll through the different websites Google provides you with in order to get your desired answer. The websites on the first page of the google search, are the ones that are most search engine optimized. Google ranks different websites in particular ways and the ones that it deems the best, are the ones that will pop up first. Since most people don’t even go to the second page of the searches, it’s important that you optimize your website as much as possible in order to appear as high as possible, and stand out to your competitors.
There are a lot of factors that play into how good your SEO is and how you can manage it in order to rank higher. These include Linkbuilding, content and features, keywords, and much more. The best way to learn how to use SEO is by reading up on it or doing a couple of courses. As there is so much to learn, it’s important that you invest the time in it, especially if you are hoping to have an easier time with advertising your coworking space website. A great place to start and get to know the basics is here.
Step 3: Try linkbuilding
Linkbuilding is proven to help tremendously with online marketing. A great place to start is here, but before we figure out how to do it we must understand what it is and why it works.
What is Linkbuilding and why is it so important?
Linkbuilding is part of the SEO strategy. It is the act of other websites linking to pages from your website. This is done to promote the “authority” to Google, meaning that it will see your website as more credible, ranking it higher than others when someone searches for coworking spaces.
In order to add links to websites, you must have something notable for them to link to. You will want to try to create content or pages that the websites you are trying to link to will make sense to. For example, creating a blog post about an aspect of coworking could be a great option.
3 Differnet types of linkbuilding:
1. Add: Manually add links to websites.
An option for this is going to a website and manually adding your link there yourself. Some of the most common link adding tactics include:
- Creating a social profile
- Blog commenting
- Posting on forums or communities
- Creating job searches
- Adding business a directory
2. Ask: Reach out to website owners directly to ask for a link.
Asking is when you reach out to certain owners of websites inquiring about them adding your link to their website. However, you can’t simply demand that your page be linked, instead, you must give them a good reason as to why they should put you on their website. There are many good reasons as to why someone may want to link your page on their website. These could be guest blogging, which is creating useful content for their website. It could also be link exchanging which is when you offer to link them back if they link you or even the skyscraper technique which is providing them with a better resource to link to (yours) than they already have.
3. Earn: Get organic links from people who visited your page.
Earning links means that someone will add your link to their website without you having to ask them to. This occurs naturally from having a great page with outstanding resources. Clearly, this isn’t super common, but it can happen nevertheless, especially if a lot of effort is put into making it great.
You can’t, however, earn links if no one knows about your website, so you have to spend time investing in it and promoting it in various ways. Once your website builds credibility and astonishes people with its great information and resources, people will naturally link to it which will create a domino effect for you, where you could spend less time advertising it (since it’ll happen naturally) and more time on creating quality content.
Reminder: There is actually a fourth way of linkbuilding, and it’s when you buy links, however, it is highly discouraged. We are telling you about it so that you know what to stay away from. Buying links does occur, however, it often results in not-so-great websites linking to your own, which can simply be a huge waste of money. Not only that but buying or selling links is a violation of Google’s Webmaster Guidelines and will result in a penalty if you’re caught. So it’s best to stay away from this type of linkbuilding, since it’s not legitimate and can cause major problems for your website.
Step 4: Put your coworking space in online listings
An online listing for a business has nothing to do with real estate, rather it’s a website or business’ presence in a search engine or directory. It’s basically a free advertisement when someone searches up your coworking space. Google is notable for its listings as they come up quite frequently and are used by many people.
To put it in simple terms it is a mini online portfolio that includes information about your business such as the name, address, hours of operation, contact information and photos, reviews, among other things.
Platforms such as Google, Yelp, and Facebook allow you to create listings for free, but it must be done manually on each one.
Why Listings and Reviews are so important for your business:
1. Increasing your online presence
Using online listings is one of the most important steps you can take in increasing your SEO. Simply put, it allows your coworking space to be visible to potential customers among your competitors. Your business is all of a sudden more searchable and appears to be more popular to the person searching.
2. Reviews make you stand out from your competition
Chances are when someone is looking for a service near them many listings will pop up with different businesses, and they are left to choose the right one for them. Not everyone has the time to carefully research each one, so they revert to analyzing the reviews. Good reviews give your coworking space more credibility, which could make someone choose you over the competition.
3. Increasing brand awareness
Listings are a great way to make your space known locally. They give you the freedom to control your company’s appearance and make sure the information you provide is accurate and relevant.
4. Reviews can help you rank higher in search engines
Having a lot of good reviews can help your coworking space grow exponentially. It is one of the most powerful free marketing tools that you can use. For Google, in particular, the better reviews you have the better your placement will be in the local organic ranking. This means that more people will see your business first.
5. More people are relying on listings and reviews to make their decisions
Customers today are trusting online reviews as much as they would a personal referral to a business or service. Most people are reading the reviews of a space before actually going forward with anything else. Another important aspect to consider is that most people rely heavily on the information provided on the listings and are more likely to call your coworking space directly from the listing, or even visit your website directly from the listing.
How to create an online listing:
Most platforms will have a feature that allows you to create a listing. The important part is that you must make sure your listing contains all the accurate information. All your listings across different platforms should include the following:
- The official name of your coworking space
- Address
- Phone number, or other contact information such as fax
- Photos
- Reviews
- Hours of operation
- Website and other social media accounts
- A short description of your space
Once you have created your listing, you should make sure you nurture it. Although it may sound simple to create a listing and let the rest work itself out, you cannot neglect it. Making sure that all the information is updated and optimal is crucial to your listing being seen. Updating your Google listing is important especially if your coworking space’s information changed or if you want engagement with events you’re hosting.
Step 5: Advertise online
Advertising online has become a big part of marketing. Ads are now on every social media outlet and can be attributed to many companies who take advantage of the new social media age. This can be a good option if you want to promote your space, but it can also be very costly, so you want to make sure you put a lot of time and effort into it so that you can get the most out of it.
Online advertising can be great because it can target specific audiences from certain regions where your coworking space may be located. The best two ways to advertise online are through Google Ads or Facebook Ads.
- Google Ads is a great way to drive traffic to your coworking space website, but it can become quite pricey. Google will allow you to pay for your ad to be displayed at the top of the search engine, however, they will charge you for each click on your ad, so you absolutely have to make sure that your website is clean, optimized, and has quality content.
- Facebook Ads are also a great option. They will be much cheaper than Google, even being able to start with only $10. Facebook is also great because it will provide you with a step-by-step resourceful guide about promoting posts on your coworking space page. The only downside of Facebook is that it is only geared towards Facebook users. So if your coworking space mostly targets companies, then it is probably not the way to go. On the other hand, if your coworking space targets freelancers then it could be a great investment.
Conclusion
Promoting your space online can be tricky, however, it is necessary if you would like your coworking space to stand out from its competitors. Although you can take many different routes when advertising online, the most important part is understanding what will work for your space and how. So make sure you analyze your space and what is best for it before making a decision on online promotion.
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