Tag: Small

Small Business Start-Up – Why You Need a Business Plan

Anyone who is starting up a business or plans to set up and run their own business needs to have a business plan. Many people think they only need to have a plan if they are going to be seeking funding either from a bank or an institution or an investor, and as such they either leave it to the last minute or just put on paper a few ideas that they think will impress an investor or figures that they think the bank or institution would like to hear or see.

This is a real mistake. A business plan can be a unique opportunity for someone to actually focus on the reality of their own business and having a business plan, model or template allows them to gauge the reality of their business in a way that simply wishful thinking will not.

There are many online draft business plans or templates available all of which have a fairly similar plan which if followed will give the entrepreneur or business owner a unique insight into the reality of their business.

A business plan should essentially have a cover sheet, an executive summary, a table of contents and the actual document itself which should include the business, financial data and any supporting documents that might be of value. This business plan can of course be used also if funding is being sought. The body of documents should focus on the nature of the business and how the thinking behind the business has developed and is developing. There needs to be a description of the business both short-term and long-term. There needs to be analysis of what competition there is, where that competition comes from, and what the weaknesses of the competition are or where you as a business owner have an entry-level advantage over them.

There needs to be some sense of how or where you intend to market or advertise your business. This will include a number of free or paid options available both online and in the real world. Social networks are a rich source of marketing but this needs to be done well and have time spent on them. Word-of-mouth recommendations from satisfied customers or clients are important and can help spread business. Knowing who’s going to help you with your business, by which personnel either paid or unpaid is important. Specify who is involved in a business and what role they have and whether they are paid, voluntary or whatever their role.

Have as much financial data available as possible. Have a specific note of loan applications, overdraft applications or any other approaches you have made the kind or pending for any funding. Have a balance sheet that is easy to update at any point. Have a list of capital equipment and expenditure as well as a list of suppliers both to and from you. If available have a profit and loss statement that is clear and unambiguous even if not audited. It is a good idea to break down the profit and loss statement as well as any yearly summary you may have into a level of detail that can easily be assimilated. This might mean giving monthly breakdowns, or quarterly breakdowns if it is more appropriate. Cash flow is or was a hugely significant issue in any business, and if you are looking to set up or run a business, having an estimate of what your cash flow is and isn’t will be ready helpful.

Have your business plan include other supporting documents can help make sense of the business. It is difficult to be prescriptive about what these documents should be, but they should include any tax or legal documents that support the nature of the business all the business itself. This can include insurance documents, leases or sub leases, tax returns either by yourself or any principles involved in the business. Copies of any franchise agreements of these are relevant as well as copies of licenses and any other legal documents that may be relevant.

Internet Marketing For Small Business – A Guide

Most small businesses don’t have huge marketing budgets, so they are looking for the most cost efficient way to get their marketing message to the most people possible. Only a few years ago, this would have been next to impossible. However, with the growth of the internet, what was recently impossible is not only possible, but is now quite easy for small business owners.

A popular internet marketing tool for small businesses wanting to start marketing online is Google AdWords. With the Google AdWords system, you can reach millions of people with your advertising message, while only paying for the people who show interest in your ads by clicking on them. This is in contrast to a more popular form of advertising which charges businesses based on how many people see their ad. The Google AdWords system of “cost per click” is much superior as it only costs the advertiser based on how many people are interested enough in their product or service to click.

One main way businesses can use Google AdWords is to advertise on the Google search engine and the rest of Google search network, which includes sites like Ask.com.

All you as an advertiser have to do to start seeing ads on these search sites is to follow these easy steps:

– Create a Google AdWords account: It is very easy to set up a Google AdWords account. All you need to do is create a Google account, or use an existing Google Account. It is very quick and easy to create your new Google AdWords account.
– The second step is to create a “campaign”. While creating your first campaign, just pick the option for showing your ads on the Google Search Network.
– Next, you’ll want to pick some keywords that searchers would use to find the product or service you offer. The closer the keywords are to what people will search, the better success you will have.
– Then write some ads that are related to your keywords and product. Make them very catchy and appealing, as you will want searchers to click on the ad and visit your site. However, make sure they are also accurate, because if your product or service doesn’t match what you advertised, the searcher won’t buy, and you’ll pay for their click without getting anything from it.
– You’ll also have to set your bid for how much you want to pay for clicks, and maybe a few other smaller settings.

Once you’ve completed these steps, you’ll soon see your ads on Google and their related search sites. This is a great way to reach millions of people, as Google has over 70% of the entire search volume on the web. If you want to reach even more people, check out Google’s display network, which allows you to advertise on other websites, even sites like the New York Times. You can start advertising on these sites within the same Google AdWords account you’ve already set up.

Within a few minutes, you could be set up to get your product or service in front of millions of people, while only paying for those that are interested in your product or service. This ability gives you a huge advantage over businesspeople of the past, who could only have dreamed about such a great opportunity!

Internet Marketing For Small Business – Part 2 of 5 Steps to Succeeding With Google AdWords

Continuing on from my last article ‘Internet Marketing For Small Business – Part 1 of 5 Steps to Succeeding With Google AdWords”, here are the final steps to ensuring a successful Google AdWords Campaign.

2. Understanding Quality Score:

Once you have added your keywords, Google will tell you your quality score. Its important that you have a good to great quality score in your keywords (usually rated out of 10), if you get a poor or OK quality score, it means you have done something wrong. It could be that you are bidding on the wrong keywords, that your landing page is not specific enough for those keywords or Google does not think your ad is related to your keywords or that the page you are sending people does not have those keywords in it.

The quality score will be determined from a number of things:

  • You need to have a high CTR: A high quality score must be over 1% and this will also depend on how your ads are showing up. If your ad is appearing on the 2nd or 3rd page, then this will mean your quality score is lower but if you are in the top 5 or 6 positions, your CTR should be over 1%. Therefore you need to work on getting that CTR as high as you with a baseline of 1% as the CTR. You should always get a CTR of over 1%, even as high as 15% and the way you get a high CTR is by testing. You write 2 different ads and see which ones performs better. Usually after 30 to a 100 clicks, you pick the ad that gets a higher click rate and write a variation on it. You then go on and write another ad that is different to that one and see which one performs better again (beating the control). When you have found a theme that performs very well, you can tweak your ads by adding a question mark, quotations around it, switch the descriptions lines or even change your url. You can do any of these things to tweak your ad so that you can get a higher CTR, thus a higher quality score.
  • Its Not A Bidding War….Most people when starting out with Google AdWords usually say “I want to be in the top position, at number 1 and I am willing to pay more than anyone else to be there”. This is the wrong way to go about it. It should not be a bidding war, it should be a fight over who is the better advertiser, that is what Google really wants. Google wants you to write an ad that gets the highest CTR so that they make more money ie. the more clicks, the more money you pay them. So if you can write a better ad than your competitors, Google will be very willing to reward you for that. They reward you by charging you less per click and putting you in a higher position on the page. Lets say your ad gets a 2% CTR and your competitor gets a 1% CTR, it probably means you are going to pay half as much per click and be ranked higher than your competitor because Google will know the user is having a better searching experience. Hence you should always have two ads running and check which ad is performing better. If one is performing badly, pause it, write a better ad and see if you can beat your better performing ad.

3. Tracking:

AdWords is probably the best system for tracking that exists. It is very easy with Google AdWords to set up your keywords and track how well they are performing ( i.e. by making you money). What is most important is to track whether the clicks are making you sales or converting into leads or sales. If your clicks are not converting, you are obviously just wasting money so it is very important that you track down at a keyword level which ones are making money for you. This is called keyword conversion tracking and there are a couple ways of doing it. The best way is to have Google do it for you. Google has some keyword conversion tracking code which they will allow you put it on your thank you or finished page and they will let you track a sale or a conversion.

The other way you can track conversions is by assigning a specific URL to every keyword (help can be found at the Google AdWords Tutorial). The better you understand how to track conversions, the better your results will be with AdWords. You will find that as you get more clicks on your campaign and by tracking everything, different keywords will perform very differently even though they may seem very similar. For example ‘dog training’ maybe very different to ‘train my dog’, you may find that one of them may convert much higher than the other one.

On another level, you can track conversions through the success of your ad campaigns. Some ads may perform better than other ads, for example one ad may have a price and the other may not, this means anyone that clicks on the ad with a price knows that they have to buy something when they go to that page – that ad will convert at a higher percentage than if you did not have the price on the ad. It will probably have a much lower CTR but also a higher conversion rate. This is really something that needs to be tested on every campaign to see if you are getting a return on investment because in the end the goal is to make the greatest amount of money. Track everything!

4. Bidding:

Over the years bidding has changed, it use to be bid low and then raise your bid and to see what the lowest point was. That is probably not the wisest thing to do anymore – at least not right now. Right now what I suggest is start by bidding high, what this does is allow you to get a good position on AdWords and a good CTR. As you establish the CTR, Google will recognize that you are a good advertiser and then you can lower your bid everyday to what Google is actually charging you (whilst maintaining your high CTR). What you need to figure out is whether you are getting a good returns for the money you are actually spending so if you are spending a $1 and getting $2 back – you know its worth continuing the campaign.

5. Last words:

Please don’t get emotional attached to a keyword because you ‘like’ the keyword or believe it should work. Do not expect to learn everything upfront and then go implementing a Google AdWords campaign effectively. If you have your own full time business and love what you are doing – then get a professional in to run your own PPC campaigns.

How Do I Get My Small Business Name to Rank #1?

This is a very common question I get all the time and if I was an SEO specialist looking to make a fast buck and not build valuable long lasting relationships, this avenue could quickly be taking advantage of. Watch out small business owners for SEO’s trying to win your business doing this very method! Making your small business name #1 in Google and other search engines is very easy to do unless your business name just happens to have a competitive term in it like, “Computer Store”. Most sites in the small business world have little to no competition in the search engines for their business name which makes it very simple to rank for. As a result of little to no competition in search engines, making some simple adjustments to your websites title tags, and scoring a local backlink or two will do the trick. Actually, most of the small business sites just need to adjust their title tag to make their business name show up #1.

I also want to stress that there is much more value in SEO then ranking #1 for your business name. Actually your business name will only be searched for by people looking for your business specifically. What brings additional value is when people search for industry related terms without your brand name in them and then that brings them to your website. That is search engine optimization.

The best return on your investment with search engine optimization is in finding a specialist that can see the whole picture and will focus on driving traffic to your site from your target audience with converting them to a sale in mind.

Getting your business name listed out on the web is important for brand awareness, but the question to ask is; other then the value of brand awareness, how much traffic and sales did getting my business name #1, drive to my website?

Quick tip: Although Google Local Listings is not organic in the context I am talking about here. I suggesting your company sign up for a Google Account and list your business name in Google Local Listings for additional search value.

Small Business SEO Tips and Tricks

Before getting into tips and tricks, here is some background information about SEO for small business owners.

SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is a strategy in web development or design that usually includes post-design promotional activity intended to enhance recognition of a site by search engines. The goal is having your small business website appear on or close to page one in Google, Yahoo, MSN, and the other major search engines. The result, especially being listed #1 on page one, may mean more traffic driven to your website with the ultimate goal of visitors converted to buying customers.

SEO may also mean a person, or Search Engine Optimizer, who is a direct employee or outside contractor with the responsibility of adjusting your small business website programming code, site content, and promotional activities to achieve page one with search engines. Like any profession, the performance level may vary widely from one to another.

Brick and mortar small business owners often launch a new website and expect the site to take over as the front line of marketing their product or service. This can be a mistake. Others just want to enhance their image by showing sophistication with a www domain that presents more content than will fit on a business card or brochure.

The first group wants traffic driven to their site, yet few small business owners truly understand Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, so some fall victim to persons offering SEO services for a fee. For the second group, just being online with a website that never changes meets their expectations, and they realize success depends on direct customer contact and marketing. A third group is similar to this last group, except they expect that just having a website will magically bring instant fortunes.

If you didn’t guess by now, there are no tricks to search engine optimization. Tips for SEO success should be based on proven techniques with long term positive results. Tricks that try to manipulate results by deceptive means, may succeed short term but will eventually fail.

Search engine algorithms for establishing ranking like Google’s PageRank are secret. The best one can do is guess how and why they change by tracking each quarterly update. Most watchers of PageRank, or PR for short, are trying to unravel what Google finds important and then manipulate their strategy to improve their ranking in search results. That could be a mistake. If adjusting strategy means manipulating what some think is important, too often they resort to deceptive means with short term gains.

I’ve written many times that deceptive practices will backfire. You will be punished. If you track PR, or follow the advice of SEO gurus, then you’ve heard the cliche “Content is King”. My position continues to be that the secret to search engine optimization is designing sites for visitors first, and then adding original quality content often to get noticed by people, and search engines.

“Content is King” needs to be changed to “Original Quality Content is King”. Traffic is meaningless if visitors don’t stick around long enough to be converted to paying customers. I believe that the tweaking of algorithms in 2007 and the downward shift in overall PR for so many sites is more than a temporary adjustment. Furthermore, I do not believe that Google is punishing website owners who provide original quality content. Instead, I believe that millions of websites set up and tweaked just to trick search engines are being caught and punished, and the PR scale in 2007 has shifted downward for quality site owners to fill in that void and redefine the PageRank range.

Small business website owners need to understand best practice SEO strategies. Here’s some search engine optimization advice that I published on my website in 2007. First is the main course from my menu to feed search engines that used an analogy comparing search engines to restaurants. Following that list are practices to avoid from that same article on my site.

Positive Search Engine Optimization practices to consider:

1. Keywords in the Page Title

2. Keywords in the H Tags

3. The Age of Your WWW Domain

4. The Size of Your Website

5. Backlinks (inbound links to your pages)

6. Keywords in Text Links

7. High Quality, Original Content

Negative or deceptive SEO practices you should avoid:

1. Do not have affiliate only advertising pages. You need original content.

2. Do not have over optimized pages. It won’t help SEO and may confuse your visitors.

3. Do not have link schemes, inbound or outbound. Deceptive practices will backfire.

4. Do not have identical content hosted on two separate domains (mirror sites).

5. Do not have plagiarized content. It is illegal, and search engines can tell.

6. Do not have foul language as in cursing, or content that is hateful or racist.

In conclusion, continue to evaluate your small business website strategy for SEO. Take advantage of the best practices and avoid the negative or deceptive methods, and you can succeed. The majority of small business entrepreneurs service a local market, so the ranking of your pages compared to the world could mean that very high PageRank is impossible. By following the tips given here, you may have enough to edge out your local competition, and that’s probably all that matters.

How Do I Market My Small Business – Article Marketing Is What I Advise All My Clients To Do

I work in the business of helping small businesses get noticed on the internet. Daily I am asked questions by small business owners about how I do so well in getting my clients ranked highly by the search engines. I have lots of tools in my bag of tricks, but if I had to say what is the main thing I use every single day it would be article marketing.

What is article marketing? Article marketing is a form of advertising in which businesses write short articles on topics relevant to their industry. These articles have what is called a resource box at the bottom of the article in which the author can link to their website or a website they are promoting. These articles are submitted to directories for publication. Many times if the content is well written the article will be syndicated to other sites all across the internet.

Article marketing is obviously good because of the traffic that it can bring you. If a person reads your article and thinks it was informative they are likely to click the link and read more on your website. They might join your list or buy a product from your site at this point. If your site is well done they may subscribe to your RSS feed or join your newsletter. If they do then you will have a consistent way to market to them provided that you continue to give them relevant, quality content.

One key that is often overlooked in article marketing is the fact that your articles provide your main website with lots of backlinks. Backlinks are when another site links to your site. When this happens you are seen by the search engines as more relevant and this you are ranked higher in the searches. The more popular the page is that has linked to you, the more weight the search engine gives it.

Another key that most businesses miss is that the article directories are often ranked very highly by Google and other search engines. When your articles are published you are seen as the industry expert because every time someone searches for information on your topic they see your articles. Wouldn’t you like it if every time a person did a search on Google they were inundated with articles written by you about that topic? If they saw all that and then found out they could have you to do the work for them they would not only let you do it, they would be excited to have you do it. That is where you want to be as a business owner.

Choosing the Right Name for Your Small Business

Choosing a Business name is as important as making a business plan for your company. In choosing the right one, you must know that there are a lot of factors that you need to consider before deciding to launch it to the public. First, it is very important that the name you will choose must be legally obtainable meaning that there are no other businesses using your name. Your Business name should symbolize the product or services that do you and you will do for the years to come. You must consider business entities as trademarks, registration and effect of name branding. We have gathered some few tips to help you get started.

It is very important that your Business name should have your products and service. It also needs to convey something meaningful and positive about your business to your target customers. It could tell the key product feature, something that your customer can benefit from it. If you’re unsure of your business try to make a couple of name and rum them by your potential customer or can be your family member, and ask them what they think of your Business name. you may also want to consider the pronunciation of you Business name, make sure that people can easily say and read it because eventually people will start to talk about your business. Next is you have to make it a point that your customer can remember your Business name, when choosing a Business name think of something that is going to be memorable, a name that your costumer can easily think of and connect to your business. It can also help if your business name in not too long or it can even rhyme. Flexibility is another thing that you want to consider. The best example for this is amazon.com. Amazon doesn’t have any direct connection with books and so it was able to expand into music, gadgets and many other kinds of products, under on one name. Lastly, your business name should standout from the rest, your name should get people’s attention or interest so much so that they want to pull out their smart phone and Google your business just to see what it is all about. Also, pick something that will look good aesthetically on business card, in print, signage’s or even on T-shirts.

Now that you have a few suggestions for creating your business name you can institute your brainstorming session. Play around with various words and create a list of suitable candidates which you may come across. Repeat the words to yourself to hear how they sound aloud. Watch your friends’ and family to see how they respond to the name.

How to Market Your Small Business Online in 7 Fast and Easy Steps

Without completing each of these steps successfully..the chances of marketing your small business online dramatically decrease. There will always be exceptions but these seven steps should be considered your building blocks to your online marketing success.

1. Your own Website.

And by this I don’t mean a corporate/brochure style site which bores visitors and has them clicking away in seconds. No. You need to entertain as well as educate your visitors.

To do this best I think it is essential to have a WordPress Website attached to your main business website…or even on a separate domain. Don’t just name it blog! Give it a keyword rich, benefit laden title…tell them how your will make their lives better. Use the common terms others use to search for your business in Google [and the other search engines].

There is lots of advice online on how to set up a WordPress site. If you are unsure you can hire someone from a site such as Elance or RentaGuru.

The beauty of WordPress is that it is so easy to use. Non-techie small business owners can add fresh content, offers, audio, and videos to their site without having to pay a webmaster every time. Small business profits is as much about saving money as it is about increased revenue.

Oh, and of course, Google and Social Media love WordPress as well. More free visitors is always nice.

2. Add a means of capturing the names and addresses of your visitors.

Unfortunately, buying cycles are getting longer and longer. This means that people are rarely going to buy from you the first time they come across you.

So, to get around this you will need:

an optin/squeeze page an autoresponder [e.g. Aweber] a series of emails in your autoresponder a free gift valuable enough that visitors will be prepared to give your their info

This may sound daunting if you’ve never done it. However it is easy to hire someone to do it for you…or even better, learn to do it yourself. These are very low cost marketing tactics with excellent results when done right.

3. Generate some visitors to your site.

You can either pay for traffic or generate it using your own time. Either way there is no such thing as free traffic…you pay with time, money or both.

Personally, I think a mixture of paid and self-generated is best. It will depend for you on your present skills and whether you are time-rich or money-rich.

Pay-per-click [PPC] is the fastest way to generate traffic. You can have visitors to your site within the hour. Sadly PPC can be very expensive and there is a learning curve. But don’t get me wrong…well done it can be a gold mine..just tread carefully and test and track your results.

Add new fresh content to your site every week. Make it fun. Make people smile as they learn new stuff and they will reward you by staying longer on your site and coming back for more.

Use photos and videos. Get them involved with competitions and surveys. My favourite tip is this…see what your competition is doing and do the opposite. No one ever got wealthy following the herd!

Other tactics to consider:

Social marketing ezine ads swapping links get all your past and present customers to sign up put your website address on receipts, signs, and all your other marketing banner ads post articles to article directories.

The more you do of each the more success you’ll have.

4. Build relationships with your prospects who have signed up.

The way to do this is to talk about their problems and offer solutions. That will get their attention!

Make sure your personalize your emails. Tell them about yourself, your family and your business. Get them to see you as a friend/trusted advisor: give them tips and tricks industry news free info

5. Make them offers

When your have their trust and they know, like and trust you…they will no longer regard your offers with suspicion.

Keep in contact regularly…you need to decide what you feel is right…but a minimum of once a week.

Make them repeated offers: vary them different bonuses discounts bundle products and services together make sure every offer has a deadline new products and services ask them what they want and need.

6. Keep doing more of the same.

The fact is you will probably lose 20% of your list a month. Make sure you keep doing each of the first five steps…this will give you a list of hungry, loyal buyers. Subscribers who look forward to hearing form you. Who want to hear your latest tips, news, and offers.

7. Never lose sight of where your focus should be:

“How can I offer more value to my customers?”

The moment you forget them and start concentrating on only yourself…they’ll know. It will come across in all your communications and marketing. Put them first, and they will stay loyal, and you will reap the rewards.

Internet Marketing 101: Online Marketing for Small Business

Introduction

You own a small business. Do you need a website? An Internet presence can be a necessity or a resource-draining boondoggle, depending on your business and your target audience. You shouldn’t build or maintain a website simply because “everyone else has one.” However, even if you own a one-person services company and get all the business you can handle through word of mouth, you can still create an online presence with a minimum of time and expense.

If and when you do develop a business website, you’ll need to make some kind of investment in Internet-based marketing. Consumers increasingly and overwhelmingly use the Internet to research and buy goods and services. This means the competition is robust, and if your site doesn’t announce its presence it will simply sit and gather (virtual) dust in some computer’s memory.

If you’ve convinced yourself that you need to enter the web marketing arena, the following report provides a fundamental primer on the most widely used tactics for both paid and free Internet advertising. Just remember that each of the topics introduced here is complex enough that there are entire books written about them, so if something appeals to you do some additional research before jumping in.

Before You Start

There are two main questions you must ask yourself before starting any marketing efforts, whether on- or offline: “Who is my audience?” and “What are my objectives?”

Audience

The audience for most business marketing activities is obviously past, present, and future customers. However, as in traditional advertising and marketing, it helps to narrow down who you are trying to reach, segmenting your market by age, geography, gender, interests, occupation. Certain methods of Internet marketing, such as pay-per-click ads, allow you to target your customers based on this type of segmentation.

Objectives

We can assume that the overall objective of most marketing is to sell products and/or services, but you may have additional objectives for online marketing. These related objectives will hopefully end up driving increased sales, but they can be more subtle than simply asking customers to buy right now. For example, your online marketing plan might include goals such as these:

  • Support and increase visibility of your company’s brand.
  • Improve search engine rankings.
  • Offer reference information related to your business sector.
  • Increase number of registered users or newsletter subscribers.
  • Drive traffic to your company website.

After defining your audience and marketing goals, you can begin to formulate an Internet marketing strategy and tactics. When getting into online marketing, it is important that you maintain brand consistency. Build on the reputation that you have already established. Your on-line presence should mirror that of your “brick and mortar” presence. Use the same logo and tagline so that people will understand that you are the same company. Having an online presence is a way to build on what you have already accomplished.

In the remainder of this report we’ll look at the most common ways you can use the Internet to deliver your message and start increasing your sales.

Table of Contents

websites

E-Mail

Newsletters

Other Announcements

Search Engine Marketing and Display Advertising

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Pay-per-Click (PPC)

Display Advertising

Social Media and Networking

Decide: Who, What, Where, When, and Why?

YouTube, Facebook, Pinterest, Etc.

Twitter

Blogs

Forums & Discussion Groups

Article Placement / E-Zines

Other Internet Marketing Outlets

Wikipedia

Directories

websites

We won’t get into the vast topic of how to build and manage a website, but if you aim to use the techniques described below, it is nearly essential to have one. Most of your marketing efforts will have a “call to action” that involves your audience visiting your website to research products or services, find contact information, sign up for a newsletter, or place an online order. Whatever you are asking people to do in your online promotions, make sure the website allows them to easily complete that task. One other vital component of any business website is an analytics program (Google offers a fairly robust application free of charge), so you can track how well your marketing efforts are working and calculate the return on your advertising investment (ROI).

How can you develop an online presence at little or no cost? There are several companies that offer free site building tools and hosting services. If you go this route, select a company that has a proven track record, so your hard work isn’t wasted when the company goes out of business or suspends the service. A couple of reliable options are Google Sites and Yola. If you have any money in your budget at all, you should probably just spend the less than $100 per year it takes to buy a personalized domain name (for example, “mybusiness.com”) and a Web hosting service. Another potential option, depending on your business and marketing goals, is to create a free blog (see below for more details). The most popular free blogging services as of this writing are WordPress and Blogger.

E-Mail Newsletters

E-mail newsletters provide one of the most highly performing avenues for marketing. You can collect customer e-mail addresses by asking visitors that come to your website to subscribe, by requesting e-mail addresses from anyone who visits your physical location, or by purchasing an e-mail list. To generate a higher rate of readership, make sure the audience is narrowly targeted and has some vested interest in your product. By sending out your newsletter on a regular schedule (weekly, monthly, quarterly, etc.) you can counteract the transient and temporary nature of Internet users by continually reminding them of your company’s existence. Affordable services like Constant Contact can be used to manage mailing lists, statistics, and opt-in/out functions.

Caveat: Sending commercial e-mail messages to people who have not agreed to receive your mailings can result in severe fines and penalties from the federal government per terms of the CAN-SPAM Act.

Newsletter content should appeal to your defined audiences, with industry- or product-related news and events, company-specific news and events, practical reference information, and interesting statistical and demographic information. The newsletter copy should publicize links to appropriate pages within your website.

You will need to maintain one or more separate lists for the purpose of sending targeted messages to particular audiences (see Other Announcements below). You might combine all your lists to send a monthly newsletter, and send other bulletins to past or potential customers as appropriate.

Other Announcements

Other announcements are e-mailings that can consist of press releases, coupons, special notices, or anything you want to communicate specifically to members of one or more e-mail lists.

Search Engine Marketing, Pay-per-Click and Display Advertising

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search engine optimization means constructing a website that is easily crawled by search engine spiders, and it encompasses a variety of techniques designed to improve your site’s (or page’s) ranking in the search engine results page. The goal is for your site to be found by searchers who are looking for sites related to a certain keyword or phrase, for example “little red wagon” if you are in the business of selling toy wagons. SEO can be divided into on-page activities (e.g., amount of content, metadata, links, programming methods and structural issues) and off-page activities (most importantly, obtaining links from other websites to your site).

Pay-per-Click (PPC)

Pay-per-click advertising refers to text ads displayed on search engine results pages (versus “organic” results achieved by SEO) and other sites, usually in the margins. In the case of Google AdWords and Microsoft’s adCenter, you can open an account and specify the keyword(s) that, when searched for, will generate an ad that links to your website. You pay only when a searcher clicks an ad and is directed to your site. In the example below, the key phrase is “little red wagon,” and pay-per-click ads are located at top (in yellow) and in the right-hand column (subtitled “Sponsored Links”). The first organic listing is “Little Red Wagon Foundation.”

A few of the benefits of PPC advertising are that you know exactly how many people view your ads, how many of those viewers click through to your website, and (if you are using a site analytics tool) what they do once they reach your site. You can also start and stop running ads at a moment’s notice, experiment with any number of ads you like, and fund your campaign with as little as $10 to start.

Display Advertising

Display advertising, also called banner advertising, means purchasing ad space on another website and placing a text and/or graphic ad with a link to your site. This technique is generally more complex and expensive than pay-per-click, but can be very powerful if the right message is shown to a tightly focused audience. To achieve optimal click-through rate (CTR), advertise on websites where you assume your target audience is visiting, rather than a general interest website. Most marketers don’t purchase ad space directly from another website, but use a banner ad network to automatically place ads on appropriate websites. A couple of the biggest names in display ad serving are DoubleClick and BurstMedia.

Social Media and Networking

Social networking is the latest buzz in the modern marketing arsenal. If you have any doubt about its impact, especially on the under-40 population, read this list. Small businesses with limited resources should weigh their time spent and the potential benefits carefully, however. It can also be difficult to measure the return on your investment for some of these tactics.

The general principle of “marketing” on social networking outlets is that people who have similar interests will virtually congregate around Web content that discusses that interest. They may be interested in product information in the form of reviews or personal opinion, but hard sale approaches are mostly discouraged and unproductive. Your goal is to become a trusted advisor-which usually means revealing your identity and at least some part of your personality. If that premise makes you uncomfortable, you might still find social networking sites valuable for market research purposes. Find out what people are buying and why, then use that information to help shape your other marketing activities.

The following section describes the more popular social media outlets and sites, but keep your eyes open for new virtual spaces where you might get more attention by getting in on the ground floor.

YouTube, Facebook, Etc.

YouTube allows you to post videos on your own “channel,” a distinct Web page that can be customized and allows for posting links back to your own website. A major positive aspect of this venue is that the number of views is posted and viewers can submit comments, so you know whether your videos are popular and why.

Facebook is considered the model for modern social networking sites. Facebook allows you (individual, corporate, non-profit, etc.) to create a page, attract “likes” and reviews, communicate with followers by posting status updates, photos and videos, and so on.

Although the previously named sites are the most popular in terms of visitors, there are a couple of business-oriented networking sites that may be more useful for making business connections. LinkedIn helps you develop a network of clients, service providers, and subject experts; find business opportunities and partners; post job openings; and more. More detailed advice on best practices for using LinkedIn can be found in many online articles and blogs.

Twitter

Think of Twitter as a mini-blog (see below) that allows you to broadcast messages of 140 characters or less. The messages appear to your “followers” on their phones or computers, as well as on Twitter.com. The biggest challenges are to gain a useful number of followers and to think of something engaging to write to them. If you are a speaker, writer, or performer Twitter can be used to let your fans know what you’re doing and when. If you have a retail store you might let your followers know that you’re offering a discounted item or running a special sale. You should post a Twitter sign-up link on your website, and within your signature line in outgoing e-mail messages. You can also gain followers by following people who work in or comment on your industry, as some Twitter users will follow those who follow them.

Blogs

The word blog originally came from the term “Web log.” There’s no real standard for what a blog is, but most commonly authors use them to comment on (and link to) other online news items, websites, or other Internet content. For the most part, direct selling on a blog is frowned upon and is probably a recipe for driving away potential readers. What do you write about, then? Well, if you run an Internet marketing firm you write about trends in Web marketing, what the search engines are up to, tips for do-it-yourselfers, or what you thought of the latest Hollywood blockbuster. Seriously, read some blogs and you will find all sorts of personal opinion mixed in with professional advice and commentary. The goal of your blog, however, should most likely be to establish yourself as an expert and trusted advisor in your chosen field.

You might also pursue getting your products, services, or website mentioned in related blogs by other industry experts. When a high-visibility blogger mentions a website on his or her blog, the site is exposed to a potential audience of new viewers. Often, blog postings are simply press releases that are picked up by sites that discuss topics related to a particular product or industry. More opportunities (and traffic) in this arena can be realized by developing relationships with individual bloggers.

Additional Tips:

  • Post an article that was written by someone else, just be sure to provide a link to the original article and give credit to the person wrote it. You can then give your commentary on the topic of the article or find a way to relate the information to local trends or challenges.

  • Ask colleagues to be “guest bloggers” by writing articles for you to post, again giving them credit and adding their byline and a link to their website. Using links is a good way to drive additional traffic to their sites so it’s a good trade-off for both parties.

  • Nick Francesco of AskNick.com said, “A blog gets people’s attention and Twitter keeps it.” Consider using these two outlets together.

Forums & Discussion Groups

A forum (also known as discussion group, message board or bulletin board) is a component of a website where users can ask questions, offer advice, or share experiences with others about a certain topic or topics. Nearly every hobby on earth has a number of popular forums wherein members offer their thoughts and feelings on all aspects of their favorite pastime. Contributing a comment (with a link to your website) in discussion groups related to your products or services can create a small surge or spike in traffic, but usually has little long-lasting effect. To maximize effectiveness, target forums on high-traffic sites that have 1,000+ users, and reply to topics with larger numbers of views (relative to other posted topics).

You can easily build your own bulletin board/forum component on your site with free or low-cost software. User forums have the potential to greatly increase the “stickiness” of a site, given a critical mass of traffic required to generate new discussions and keep participants interested in returning. You can start by “seeding” topics on your own, but there won’t be any results until traffic is directed to the forums. The conundrum for small businesses may be the time required to moderate a forum once it becomes successful. One solution is to seek out a volunteer moderator who exhibits a keen interest in your field. A sample of a baseball trading card forum is shown in the screen shot below.

Article Placement / E-Zines

Another avenue for generating incoming links and traffic to your site is the free article market. Article submission (or e-zine) websites allow you to publish articles on a variety of topics. Examples include EzineArticles and ArticleCity.com.

Depending on terms of use, these articles may be used as content on other websites, or collected on the site where submitted. The main objective of most article contributors is to increase their search engine rankings with the placement of backlinks on other reputable sites. Providing reliable and accurate reference information is secondary, and the traffic potential from article readers is questionable.

Obtaining links from article submission sites isn’t likely to improve your site’s search engine rankings much. However, existing content from a print newsletter or other written material can be re-purposed with a relatively small time investment. Be aware that creating articles from your website’s content verbatim may cause search engines to penalize your site, as the search engines take a dim view of text that is republished multiple times (“duplicate content” in search engine optimization terms). Submitting articles to sites with the most traffic will give your site the best chance to be discovered by new readers.

Caveat: Once an article is submitted, you have little or no control over who uses your content and for what purpose, depending on the copyright policies of the site on which the article is posted.

Other Internet Marketing Outlets

Wikipedia

Wikipedia is, essentially, an online encyclopedia. The unique aspect of Wikipedia is that users generate the content, though content must be approved by volunteer editors. Traffic will grow if and when others link to the entry. If you add content, your time commitment will be relatively minor, and the benefits might include improved search engine ranking and a slight increase in traffic to your site. As with other forms of Internet communication, a Wikipedia entry that is essentially a commercial for a product, service, or company will not be viewed positively and is unlikely to be approved by editors.

Directories

Online directories allow Internet users to browse through categories of topics to find websites related to a certain subject. There are directories for businesses, blogs, websites in general, and more. Many directories are free, and some only list you if you pay. The mother of free directories is the Open Directory Project, and by all accounts the best paid directory for business is the Yahoo! Directory ($299 annually). Be aware that you might wait a long time for some of the free directories to list your site, as they may rely on volunteer screeners. Directories not only allow consumers to find you in their listings, they also help get your site indexed in the major search engines. If you submit your site to a directory, make sure to read the submission guidelines and follow them exactly.

Common Small Business Web Design Mistakes to Avoid

As a small business owner, you probably already know that your website is a very important tool for marketing your brand and reaching your target audience. Ensuring your website design is attractive and functional to your audience is also necessary for success. Unfortunately, there are quite a few small business web design mistakes that are all too common. Sometimes this occurs when small business owners hire a cheap designer and believe they’re getting a value, although sometimes it’s mistakes the website operator makes by excluding certain important information.

To make sure you maximise the potential of your business website, keep these pitfalls in mind and avoid them.

Mistake 1: Not Building Trust

Building trust with your audience is arguably the most important thing any small business web design should do. There are actually some really easy and quick ways to build trust, as well as improve your conversion rate. Start my making sure your full address, company name and phone number is included on every page, preferably the footer. If you have an e-commerce storefront, make sure you are displaying badges like your SSL certificates and sitelock. After all, most people are not going to want to place an order if they doubt the professionalism and security of your website.

If you are a very small business or a freelancer, it also helps to add a picture of yourself to your “About Us” page along with a personal quote. Be prepared to be very transparent about your services and offer as much detail as possible, including any return policy or guarantees you provide. You should also have a privacy policy on your website, which tells your visitors what you will and will not do with their personal information that’s collected.

Finally, consider adding the rel=”publisher” link to your homepage, which points to your business’s Google+ page. This way, the image used on your Google+ profile will be displayed alongside your website on Google search results.

Mistake 2: Website is Too Flashy

It’s not uncommon for business owners to get a little carried away with the content and design of their website, requesting flashy graphics and bold colours that detract, not add value. To effectively market your brand and improve visibility, you want a clean and minimalist interface that impresses customers but makes it easy for them to find what they are looking for.

Content should be straight-forward and relevant, not a long rambling monologue or an excuse to stuff in keywords unnaturally. Users should come away with a good experience and feel like they found exactly what they were looking for.

Mistake 3: No Call to Action Buttons

Call to action buttons are important because they funnel your visitors further into your site. By keeping website users on your website for a longer amount of time, you’ll lower your bounce rate and increase the chance of a conversion. It also improves user experience by directing users exactly where they want to go, assuming it isn’t overdone. If you sell insurance, for example, you would have a call to action button encouraging users to request a quote. If you sell products online, you would have a call to action button for users to “Buy Now” or “Add to Cart.”

Mistake 4: Not Using the Rel=”Nofollow” Tag on Outbound Links

Finally, a really common small business web design mistake is not using the rel=”nofollow” tag on outbound links away from the website. While it may not seem like a big issue, it actually allows you to control the “link juice” of your website, which gets leeched out to all of your “dofollow” outbound links. Only links going to your internal pages should be “dofollow,” which means they pass along this link juice.

It’s also important to avoid linking to a lot of low authority or low quality websites, especially if you do not have a great deal of inbound links to your website.

Unfortunately, these mistakes are all too common, but very easy to fix, for the most part. As they say, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, so the best option is avoiding these mistakes in the first place by working with an experienced individual who can create a custom web design for your business.

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