You’d be insane to start a business just to be like everybody else. Why would you want to be more of the same? What reasons would you be giving to customers to choose your business over someone else’s? Would you even be having fun running the business?

The whole point of starting your own company is to do what you want to do, not copy everyone else. So of course, you will want to be unique. Sometimes your new methods might not be working when it comes to marketing, sales, and public relations. Looking across the industry you’ll see things that do work that other businesses are doing.

Does this mean you should stop trying to be unique and just be relevant to current consumer and business trends? Here lies the battle within every small business owner. To be or not to be, that is the question.

Where you should

Small business owners don’t have a manual on how to be successful. They have the resources of knowledge they can dip into like certain business mentors. But in reality, there is no right answer for every question. There are plenty of wrong answers though.

There are times where you shouldn’t be so outlandish without proper cause, and times when the ball is firmly in your court. For example, design your product from the ground up and don’t try to copy a competitor even if they have something that seems to be useful. You’ll forever be following in their footsteps and playing a reactionary role instead of taking the initiative.

You should be unique in your approach to social media, do things that will grab people’s attention and don’t be afraid to experiment. Make your presentations to clients fun and interactive, show your personality and try to think of creative ways to get them to understand your viewpoint. 

Where you shouldn’t

Online advertisements in both media and text form are highly linked back to algorithms. They’re incredibly complex and numbers-oriented. So when it comes to your click-through-rate, you should take heed of what the trends are in Google Ads. If consumers are searching for fresh vegetables, your ad will get more clicks if it features more of those words. For example, an ad that says ‘fresh green vegetables’ will receive more clicks per viewing than ‘vegetables for salads’.

But Is CTR an Organic Ranking Factor? Well according to the article, Google denies that it does but SEO specialists argue strongly against this. It seems like the algorithm wants accuracy and if you try to be unique in your usage of keywords, you’ll get a lower conversion rate of clicks per viewing. Stick to the keywords and don’t add too many descriptive words alongside them, but use key phrases in the right places to nail home your message.

It seems like the modern way of business is to know when and where you can be creative and unique. Small business owners need to follow CTR trends to achieve a higher rate of success. But be creative in how you approach your visual marketing, presentation, and sales methods.