Google +1 ~ Social Marketing?
Google ~ Social Network?
Google recently released an experimental +1 (Plus One) for a select few in the United States. This is clearly to rival the Facebook Like button. Google is looking for ways to break into the Social Network arena – Buzz was a flop – what will the future hold for the +1
By clicking the +1 icon next to a listing (you must be signed into your Google Account) you are publicly voting for that website. When your friends (connected to you through your Google Account) are searching for something and you have already voted for that website it will show in their search results. It is like saying, “I trust and recommend this site – why don’t you take a look also.”
Since this is in a testing phase I am sure there will be features and benefits added before it is widely released. For now if you want to be on the cutting edge then ask for your friends to +1 your website in the Google listings. Time will tell what advantages this will provide. Whatever they are I am sure it will be better for our marketing efforts to participate.
Pay Per Click Advertising That Works
Pay Per Click Copy Writing can be tricky
The biggest complaint I get about Google Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising is the quality of the clicks. A campaign that gets a great deal of clicks but does not convert those clicks to sales is simply quite expensive. Small businesses are less likely to take a chance on PPC simply because they have no faith in the click converting into a sale.
Online Sales Cycle
If you think of PPC as a sales cycle, and learn to grab the shopper at the right moment during their product/services research then PPC can be very rewarding.
Let’s analyze how people usually become buyers of online products and services. One of my potential customers is starting their online research for purchasing a website. They probably do not know what to ask a web designer, or even what they are searching for. They may type something like “Web Design” They will get several of the huge nation-wide companies that market to large businesses. By reading the sites they learn that they want a local web designer that they can meet in person. Or they may decide they need a website that is smaller in scale than what they are reading about. So they now search for “Web Design Vancouver Wa” This is a key phrase that will get them a list of designers local to them (assuming they live in Vancouver WA). This could be web designers that are all over the board in what they actually do. They are now reading sites by the larger design firms all the way down to the college student that creates sites on the side for extra cash. After spending some time researching Web Design they have a better idea of what they are looking for in a website and in a designer. While conducting this research they have been clicking on PPC advertising – but not actually buying. They have not been in the buying mode but in the research mode – this means that all the sites they have visited had PPC campaigns that is costing them money but not converting sales. Now they have a better idea of what they want they type in “Small business website design in Vancouver WA” or “E- commerce website designer in Vancouver WA” or even “5 page informational website Vancouver WA”. All of these are considered buying keyword phrases, and if you were a website designer in Vancouver Wa and had PPC campaigns with these buying keyword phrases then you would likely have a new customer (assuming you are a good web designer with a website that will convert sales)
This process works for any product – the more generic the keywords the more virtual tire kickers you will attract. The more specific your keywords are to the product or service you offer then the more qualified that click traffic will be.
Of course if you do not have a quality website that clearly states what you do and what your product/service will do for someone then a quality PPC campaign just wont matter. If your site is state of the art and full of benefit oriented information then you are ready to embark into the world of PPC armed with the knowledge of choosing buying keyword phrases that your potential customers will be searching with at the end of the cycle – when they are ready to make the purchase.
Local Search: Online Profits
Small Businesses Move Online
More and more business owners are moving away from the expensive local directories like all the various yellow pages, simply because of cost vs effectiveness. When was the last time you used the physical phone book to search out information? I personally recycle mine as soon as I get them.
More and more people are looking for information Online ~ researching products, services, and companies ~ then choosing to buy local. With statistics like:
- 97% of Internet users in the U.S. gather shopping information online, and of those consumers 51% explicitly characterize their behavior as “Shop Online, Purchase Offline” (NPD Group)
- New Research by The Kelsey Group and ConStat Indicates 70% of U.S. Households Now Use the Internet When Shopping Locally for Products and Services.
Findings also suggest the Internet is poised to surpass newspapers as a local shopping information resource. - 60% of activity online is one way or another “related to local content” (Google 5/03)- For every one dollar U.S. consumers spend online, another five or six are going to offline purchases that are influenced by online research
(MIT Technology Review, April 2005, “E-Commerce Gets Smarter“)
Do you want your business to gain from Local Search?
Ways to capitalize on the Local Search Trend for your business
There are basically 2 ways to get your company listed locally ~ pay to have a company do it for you or do it yourself. For the DIY business owners out there ~ here are a few ideas and strategies that can help you get your business listed locally and start to gain more local clients and sales.
1) Do a search for your main keyword followed by your city and state. Make sure your business is listed in any online directories that come up in the search.
2) Get a Google Local account, Local Bing account, and Local Yahoo account. Make sure your site is listed in local versions of all search engines.
3) Participate in local directories that offer consumer ratings or reviews. Ask good clients to give a positive review at the different Online review sites. A few examples are:
- Yelp.com
- MerchantCircle.com
- CitySearch.com
- InsiderPages.com
- YahooLocal
- Google Local
Online review sites are becoming very popular and users are checking up on businesses before deciding who to buy from. This is a must for a local business that is wanting to pull in more Online business.
4) Local events ~ if your business hosts local events then get them listed online at sites for local events in your area.
These are a starting point for getting your business recognized online locally. As all search engine efforts – this is an ongoing process that needs ongoing attention. Some effort each month will build to quite a large Online presence over time.
For more strategies for marketing your business online visit: Internet Marketing Strategies for Small Businesses
Search Engine Optimization: Basics For Business Owners
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Basics
Business owners know a few things about Search Engine Optimization ~ it is expensive, difficult, and needs to be outsourced. I am here to tell you a secret – are you ready? Are you listening? SEO is not hard, not complicated, and not beyond your reach. It is actually easy, just time consuming. The most basic concept is this – use keyword phrases that you want search engines to index for your company. That is it – the whole concept. Now for the strategy ~ where do you use these keywords? Here is a rundown of several places where keywords need to be utilized:
- Website Title
- Page Titles (each page needs to be different)
- Article Titles – These titles need to be Header1 or H1 tags
- Articles need to use subtitles – Header 2 – Header 6 – like an outline
- Anchor text (the link that is actually clicked is the anchor)
- Near the beginning of each page’s first paragraph
- Bold keywords have more weight
- The last phrase on the page
- Picture alt and title tags
- Meta tags
Let’s explain a few of these. Continue reading
Marketing Your Business Online
Mike Klingler of Renegade University interviewed me at the Marketing Merge offices in Portland Oregon. My focus has always been helping brick and motor businesses figure out how to gain clients and sales form the Internet. Enjoy the interview – It is my hope you will gain a few nuggets that you will find useful in your business.
Internet Marketing Strategies For Small Businesses
How Can Effective Internet Marketing Skills Benefit Your Business?
What stops most small business owners from marketing their business is knowledge, a plan and a vision of the newest Internet Marketing techniques.
Internet Marketing, as I teach it, is where you as an owner discover there is a need to include new principles of 
marketing to supplement your current plan. These skills will draw people to you and your business on a daily basis, rather than having to spend a lot of money on marketing and advertising expenses.
Evaluate Your Internet Marketing Strategy
Review your current marketing plans and ask yourself the following questions:
- Do you have a business Website?
- Do you have a business Blog?
- Is there an Email Address on your Contact Pages?
- Do you have an online Contact List System?
- Do you offer an E-Commerce Shopping Cart?
- Is your website registered on Google and other search engines?
- How much do you spend a month on Advertising?
If you don’t have an Internet Marketing Strategy and don’t know how to get one, here are some strategies to use and methods you could use for your marketing. There is no need to do all of them.
Online Marketing Strategies:
- Social networking sites – setting up your Facebook, Twitter, and Ning profiles
- Pay per click advertising, Google Adwords
- SEO (search engine optimization), anchor text, keywords, and linking strategies
- Monthly and/or weekly newsletters
- Article marketing and writing content on Squidoo, Hub Pages, and EzineArticles
- Hire freelance writers to create content for you
- Set up your own SEO optimized WordPress Blog
- Email marketing and autoresponders
- Create Landing pages
- Social Bookmarking such as Twitter, StumbleUpon, Digg, Technorati, etc.
- Create, market, and share Videos and Podcasts
- Are you open to learning skills that would help bring prospects to you and your business?
Are you ready to make money Internet Marketing?
Now that you are in a position for your income to increase, take time to consider what you will do with the growth and 
prosperity from your business.
Marketing Traditional Businesses website is here to help you get your questions answered as you develop your business with Internet Marketing strategies. You can go as far as you desire and gain customers and profits as you learn with step-by-step video training.
Online Marketing Strategies For Traditional Businesses
The Online Marketing Strategies That Work the Best
The following marketing strategies apply to any of the following businesses: Finance, Insurance, Real Estate, Brick-and-Mortar, Construction, Cleaning, Services, Health Industry, Sales, Landscaping, Hospitality Industry, Travel, or any traditional or small business.
A recent Forbes study says the best strategy to generate online sales is to start with Search engine optimization
(SEO).
Search Engine Optimization
SEO, is getting traffic to your website from the search engines. The earlier on the front pages it appears, the more visitors you will receive from the search engine, such as Google, Yahoo, Bing or MSN.
As an Internet marketing strategy, SEO, looks at how search engines work and what people search for. Learning to build your web presence for content, HTML coding, proper use of keywords, videos, images and shopping carts will get results on the search engines.
How Do You Learn Search Engine Optimization Training?
You can study SEO on your own or learn from SEO Optimization Tutorials and learn the tips to optimize your site and succeed on the web. There are practical tips on this blog to get some basic understanding of how to apply this important principle to your business marketing plan.
According to eMarketer, the resource for Internet market research, the next most effective online marketing strategies for small businesses are e-mail, e-newsletters, pay-per-click, viral marketing, and social networking.
Social Networking is Another Key to Your Internet Marketing Plan 
Social networking is what makes the above strategy work and is expected to expand as marketers use it more. Social media marketing is effective and is where networking at websites helps influence your brand reputation. It increases awareness and improves search rankings and website traffic.
Marketing Traditional Businesses website is here to help you get your questions answered as you develop your business with Social Media and Internet Marketing strategies. You can go as far as you desire and gain customers and profits as you learn step-by-step video training.
Internet Marketing: Get More With Less Effort
Getting More Mileage Out Of Your Efforts
People often ask, “What do you do once you created your content?“ Creating content and posting to your Blog/Website is just the beginning of a whole process. After publishing the content people need to know you have posted your next words of wisdom or helpful article. Here is the process that I use to get traffic to my new content.
After publishing my new article I copy the link to that post directly. I go to HelloTxt.com which I have preset up to connect to all my other Social Media Sites. I create a short update and paste the link into the provided box. Then hit UpDate. This populates my entire network of Social Sites with my new status update and the link to my new content. Now all my Friends/Followers simply click a link and get to my new information.
This is very simple in concept – but it does take some setting up. However once it is set up then using the “system” is very easy. Let’s take a look at Hellotxt.com -
As you can see HelloTxt connects Continue reading
Niche Marketing: Where The Gold Can Be Found
Simple Steps to Success in Niche Marketing
Define your niche and there needs.- Talk the language of your niche
- “Hang out” where your niche is on the Internet
- Create Content targeted towards your niche
- Post content on the Internet and link it to your services, products, website
- Be consistent and as your content grows so will your traffic
Here is an in depth explanation of a few of these steps.
Step 3
Discover where your niche market likes to socialize on the Internet and then join those sites. This is important since it will do no good to be somewhere that your target market never goes. Example: my niche is Small Business Owners so I use LinkedIn, FaceBook, and Twitter. Every industry has social sites on the Internet.
How Does Your Name Rank In Google?
What Do People See When They Google Your Name?
As a small business owner it is essential that people trust you online – if you ever plan to actually sell online. People buy from people they trust ~ any “negative press” can kill the deal ~ even if the press is not actually about you, but about someone else with your name! It is hard to tell when researching online if you are reading something about the right person. Have you ever researched someone and read something bad about that person just to find out that it was the wrong person ~ with the same name? Something like that can absolutely kill the sell if it happens when someone is researching YOU!
The goal is to get anything bad associated with your name to be somewhere beyond the 2nd or 3rd page of the search results. Everything on the first 2 or 3 pages of the search results needs to be positive, items you have published, and positive feedback from customers.
Strategies That Work
Let me share what I have done to dominate the search engines for my name ~ feel free to use these tactics to help with your name as well.
This is a list of strategies I am using to control my name. The last thing I want is for someone looking for a Web Designer to find my site then research my name and find anything negative. I don’t care if it is something talking about a different Dotty ~ people will think it as me and go elsewhere for their business ~ something I just can’t afford.
If you have more ideas for people feel free to add them in the comments section!
More training on Online Marketing for Small Businesses…