Do you own your digital presence? If your social media manager, digital marketers, or website managers went away, would you still have your content, customer data, and analytics? If the answer is no, reading this article could be extremely beneficial to you — and the online longevity of your brand.
If you’re a business owner, having a strong and relevant digital presence is essential, as almost every industry and vertical has a competitive marketing landscape. Having a digital marketing partner to help you create, grow, and cultivate your digital presence can take some of the pressure off while you focus on running your business. But if you’re not careful, you could end up losing everything you have built in the virtual world.
The digital marketing experts at Baal & Spots — an agency that helps businesses establish, maintain, and grow their online presence — are here to discuss the importance of digital presence ownership and the steps you can take to accomplish it.
Ready to conquer the virtual world? Need help developing cutting-edge and tailored content marketing and social media strategies? Let’s start a conversation about what Baal & Spots can do for you and your goals.
Why is it important to have an online presence?
How important is digital presence? Having a digital presence is tremendously important. It’s no secret that not having an online presence can hurt your business tremendously; now more than ever, customers are using social media and the internet as a whole as a search platform to find what they need.
Being very online dramatically increases your business's visibility, allowing potential customers to find you easily when searching for products or services you offer. Without an online presence, you are missing vital marketing and sales opportunities that would be impossible to reproduce elsewhere.
Some of the benefits of online presence for businesses include:
- Cost-effective marketing strategy
- Increased brand awareness and visibility
- Reach your target audience where they are
- Engage with customers in real time
- Gain customer insights and data
- Build trust and credibility among your audience
- Flexible and adaptive
- Low barriers to entry
The importance of digital presence is something that you should never overlook. Marketing yourself online is no longer optional for businesses looking to thrive in the modern marketplace: it’s non-negotiable.
What does it mean to “own” your digital presence?
When we talk about owning your digital presence, we're referring to having full control and access to all aspects of your online footprint. This includes:
- Your website
- Social media profiles
- Ad management accounts
- Analytics tools (Google Analytics, Mixpanel, etc.)
- Pixel and tag manager accounts
- Customer data
- Anything that represents your business online
Now, you might be wondering why you wouldn’t own your own digital presence? Well, it depends on the choices you make in the beginning stages. Did you create all of your social media profiles, your website, and more on your own? Or did you hire someone, like a third-party agency, to help you produce every aspect of your online footprint?
People just getting into the digital marketing game might be surprised to hear that some digital marketing agencies own the digital presences of their clients, but this is the sad reality for many marketing agencies.
Spoiler alert: this is not how we do things at Baal & Spots.
Hiring an agency to help you put your business on the digital map is a great strategy; however, if you hand over the full set of keys and keep none for yourself, you could land yourself in some sticky situations. Let’s dive into it.
3 disadvantages to not owning your digital presence
Here are some scenarios that illustrate why not owning your digital presence can be problematic down the line:
1. You and your agency break up
Let’s say that you and your digital marketing partner work together to set up your social media profiles, launch a bright and shiny new website, and activate ad accounts across multiple platforms. You think you two are a match made in heaven — a team. Nothing could ever go wrong between you! But then, suddenly, you have to part ways with your agency partner.
Breakups always hurt, but this is different. Once you’re ready to manage your online endeavors on your own, you realize you don't have admin access to these accounts because there wasn’t a proper transfer of ownership. Their phone numbers are linked to your two-factor authentication. They have all of your passwords. They managed your website in a program you’ve never heard of. Your historical data, audience insights, and even the accounts themselves might be out of reach for you.
Not having access to your own online property can create large roadblocks for you and your business.
2. You have to start from scratch
That agency that you hired offered to help you build your new website. It looks great, it works flawlessly, and you’re gaining more traffic and users than ever before. But then, the contract with that agency ends, and you realize that you can’t take your new website with you.
That’s right: the agency owns your website and you have to start over from scratch. With this horrible realization, you lose all of the content and data that you’ve built up since launch. If you plan on hiring another digital agency to help you create a new site, make sure there is no fine print in their contracts that allows them to own your digital property.
3. You lose all of your data
Analytics are the heartbeat of any business. They allow you to measure what is working and what isn’t within your marketing. Without access to your data, you’ll struggle to find and maintain online success. Well, businesses that don’t own their data run into many issues.
Remember when Universal Analytics (UA) just went away in July of 2024? We do. Luckily, we were prepared whereas many businesses found their report integrations suddenly stopped working. If you don't own your data, you might lose access to crucial historical information when platforms change or shut down. Data challenges can be extremely difficult and time-consuming to overcome, but the right partner (who won’t own your data) can help you navigate this.
For example, here at Baal & Spots, we prefer to use custom data solutions to provide more event-based tracking and customized reporting, which can be crucial in a post-cookie world. Tools like Mixpanel offer more flexibility in data collection and analysis compared to traditional sources like Google Analytics. Using them in tandem allows us to provide you with better data that we can use to craft sounder strategies moving forward.
Benefits of owning your digital presence
If it isn’t obvious by now, owning your digital presence should be non-negotiable for businesses small and large. These scenarios above aren't just inconvenient for you and your team; they can seriously impact your business continuity and growth. Owning your data permits you to have:
- Complete control over your online presence
- Continuous access to your historical data
- Access to valuable data at all times (no matter who you’re partnered with)
- Enhanced privacy and security
- Customized analytics and reporting
- The ability to adapt when new changes in the marketing world arise
Now, we want to note that there is absolutely nothing wrong with hiring a third-party business to manage your data — in fact, we encourage it! We are a digital marketing agency, after all. We want to bring awareness to business owners who may be taken advantage of by signing away the rights to their digital presence.
Taking action: Step-by-step guide to owning your online data
If our words have resonated and you’re ready to to action to own your digital presence, here are some steps you can take to make that happen:
- Audit your current setup: Identify all of your digital assets and who currently controls them. This can include social media accounts, Google listings, ad manager accounts, your website server, and more.
- Gain access: If your setup is with a third-party agency, ask for admin access and every login to ensure that you can access each platform, even if you part ways. No account should be linked to a third party’s phone numbers or email addresses.
- Think outside of the analytics box (research tools): See how advanced tools like Mixpanel can provide more detailed and customized insights that can help your business’s unique goals.
- Develop a data strategy: Plan how you'll collect, store, and use data in compliance with privacy regulations.
- Partner wisely: When working with agencies or third parties, ensure that your ownership of your digital assets is clearly defined in your contracts (it will be if you decide to work with Baal & Spots).
Who you choose to partner with for your digital marketing efforts is crucial for the overall success of your online efforts. Trustworthy, collaborative, and effective marketing partners are out there! You just have to search the name “Baal & Spots” to find them! Get it? It’s us. We’re the right partner.
Want to know how to create a digital presence? Hire Baal & Spots to be your digital marketing partner.
As you juggle the many challenges that come with running a business, having that extra help can take a lot off of your plate; however, the importance of digital presence in today’s marketing landscape is too important to completely outsource. Finding the right digital marketing partner to help you cultivate your online presence while you maintain ownership will ensure continuity, flexibility, and control.
With Baal & Spots, you’re always the captain of the ship — we’re simply helping you steer, raising the sails, and looking out for any danger on the horizon.
Whether you need a website management service or branding and messaging, the digital experts at Baal & Spots are by your side to help you achieve your goals. The sooner you start, the faster you’ll grow — contact us today to get started.
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