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The Future of Small Business’ IT Budgets

July 7th, 2011

The end of the year is always stressful for small and large businesses alike because it’s the time of the year to evaluate the successes and failures of their company. It is also the time when small business’ IT budgets are reevaluated and employees’ ideas can be implemented with the New Year.

The prediction for small business’ IT budget trends for 2011 is that nearly half will increase their IT budgets, with only approximately 9 – 10% decreasing their IT budgets. So what does this signify? It confirms the notion that Internet marketing and web related services and products are fast becoming more of an important component to the survival of a company than previous traditional methods of marketing and advertising.

There are many reasons as to why more than half of small businesses are planning to increase their IT budgets in the upcoming year, but the majority will cite reasons that include expansion, marketing for specific projects, and a want to increase their online visibility. Other areas of focus are the expansion into more social media sites, email (marketing and campaigning), and website development and improvement. These predictions mean good news for companies focused on web services, online security, web design, programming, content writing, marketing, storage, and wireless technology.

The 50% of small businesses that have realized their need to dedicate more money to their IT budget are going into a successful direction in 2011. These businesses will be able to better compete with large companies who have nearly unlimited amounts of funds to put into their IT products and services. Even those small businesses who plan to expand their IT budget but still have constrained cash flow, will have at least more of an opportunity to invest in SEO campaigns, keyword research, link building, Pay Per Click advertising, and viral marketing techniques — all of which ultimately help to increase website visibility and traffic.

The increase of small business’ IT budgets also signifies solid growth in small business’ openness and welcoming of experimenting with new IT ideas, marketing methods, and programs. Additionally, the fact that nearly half of small business’ IT budgets are predicted to expand with the New Year, means that ultimately IT related businesses will have to expand themselves. This in turn will push them to create even better and more polished ideas of marketing and communication for the following year.

Small business’ increased IT budget spending could not only help to boost the economy in the country but could also help to bridge the gap between smaller business’ online visibility in relation to dominating large corporations. One thing that can be certain about all of these predictions is that the leap of faith of those small businesses that plan to increase their IT budget in the 2011 year are sure to reap more rewards of those who decided against increasing their IT budget.

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Starting Small Businesses Has Never Been Easier

July 7th, 2011

I believe that it’s easier to succeed with small businesses than ever before. There are more opportunities for entrepreneurs to start small businesses today than at any previous time.

Here are some good reasons for why I believe this is true.

A) With the increase in population comes an increase in opportunities for small businesses.

Generally, a sparse population requires a small business owner to provide a wide variety of goods or services to survive. With a denser population, the small businesses can still survive by providing a very narrow range of products or services.

For example, in a smaller population a small business which provides gardening services would probably need to offer many things. Services could include general garden maintenance, planning, tree felling, lawn cutting, vermin control, pond planning and maintenance, hard landscaping etc.

With a bigger population a small business could thrive perfectly well by providing just one of these services, as there are more people who will need it.

B) The costs involved in starting and running small businesses has never been so low in proportion to income.

Technology has replaced many of the things which people used to do, and technology does the job a lot more cheaply.

Today it’s possible to reach literally millions of potential customers around the world very cheaply.

For example, only a few decades ago the cost of mailing to thousands of households was prohibitively high. Unless you had a very good product or service which sold well, a small business just wouldn’t risk it.

Another example, business premises security used to involve security guards walking around checking that all was well. Now a good security system can be bought for less than 1 week’s pay for that security guard, and it will work 24 hrs per day for years, for no pay.

C) Because modern life is so complex today, small businesses and individuals are open to new ideas, products and services like never before.

This creates a huge market for training courses, information provision services, educational aids, specialised products and services, novelties, etc.

With this great diversity come great opportunities to combine different products and technologies, thus making whole new areas of business possible.

For example, you can combine a low-light camera with wireless communications and a bird box. This means a nest may be watched remotely on a television or personal computer screen.

Another example would be to combine voice-chip technology with passive infrared technology to make it sound as though you have a huge dog indoors whenever anyone approaches your house.

In our recent history, these opportunities just didn’t exist.

D) It may not feel like it, but many people today have a lot more leisure time and a higher disposable income than in any previous age.

This spare income (and with the current attitudes to loans, a little more besides) tends to get spent on sports, games, hobbies, crafts, amusements, entertainments, holidays and weekend breaks etc.

This creates many opportunities for the entrepreneur to start up small businesses to satisfy all this extra demand.

E) To thrive in a modern society you need to have a lot of different skills.

Nowadays people cope with a variety of complex tasks. They buy and use a wide range of consumer equipment, fill out many forms, and communicate with all kinds of people from all walks of life (often from different countries and cultures). They also do difficult transactions like house purchasing, and so on.

All this is a long way from the average people who were around just a few hundred years ago. Many were farm labourers who could barely read or write and never travelled more than a few miles from home.

So now, the pool of potential business people is far greater than ever before. If a person can live well in a modern society, they already have the abilities they need to start up a small business enterprise and succeed.

The good news also is that if you lack a certain skill which your small business needs, then you can probably employ someone with that skill far more easily than ever before.

F) More people have access to money than ever before.

Until the late 1960s, most people were paid weekly and spent money as they earned it.

It was normal among manual workers to run right out of money around the time of their next pay packet, which often contained notes and coins!

Today most people have many bank accounts (with overdrafts) and access to credit cards, which alone have spending limits equal to a half or full year’s income.

Savings and share holdings are greater than ever before. A large proportion of the population can raise money on their house and if they don’t mind paying a high interest percentage, they can borrow with no security at all.

A great variety of people and institutions are now willing to lend money for good small businesses proposals.

With access to credit, you can buy the product, ship it to the customer and get paid before you have to pay for the goods which you sold. This just wasn’t possible until very recently.

G) Advice, courses and books about starting small businesses are within easy reach of everyone.

Researching your chosen business area has never been easier with the Internet so readily available.

Not so long ago, you would have needed to buy many books and read them all to get the specific information you required. Now you can ask a search engine very specific questions and get very specific answers, almost immediately.

This frees up small businesses and enables them to be far more productive and enterprising.

H) If you start a small business today you have an immense amount of technology available to you.

Computers, printers, copiers, audio and video recording and playback equipment, telephony and the internet are all easily available to any entrepreneur wanting to get started in a new small business enterprise.

Not long ago, the average multi-national company lacked the computing, communicating and printing power available to the ordinary person today.

You can probably think of at least 6 different ways to get a simple message to someone on the other side of the world. 5 of those messages would typically arrive less than 1 minute after you sent them.

Just 100 years ago, (and remember mankind has been around for about 3 million years) this same message would have involved horses and steam ships and would have taken months.

This massive improvement in technology (especially in communications and information) has really opened up the field to the individual who wants to go ahead with a new small business venture.

I) Small businesses starting up today have far more choices available to them.

In previous times, it was quite common for there to be only a few companies that they could go to, to buy business supplies. Whatever business you care to name, you would not find many suppliers of the materials needed to conduct that business.

Unless your business is in a very specialist area, you will now find you can source your supplies from a great many firms. This in turn drives your costs down, as you can shop around for the best deals.

For example, there used to be very few ways to get your goods delivered to your customers. Nowadays you could chose from literally hundreds of different carriers.

New companies can chose anywhere in the world to set up their small businesses, or indeed where to place any part of their business.

I know of a successful paintball company, which operates in the UK in summer. But when the business falls off due to the cold winter, they find new customers by simply moving the company to Brazil, and then return the following spring.

They also take advantage of the cheaper labour in Brazil to manufacture the paint balling equipment, and when back in the UK use the greater expertise in the UK to program their systems.

Not so long ago this flexibility of operating a small business would have been totally impractical.

Conclusion.

There are far more opportunities to start small businesses than ever before and entrepreneurs who do start new small businesses at home are more likely to succeed.

There are more potential customers, it costs less to start up and you have more choice over the kind of business to go into. Other benefits are a more skilled and educated workforce, and easy access to financial support.

If you do want your own enterprise, you can also use the power of the Internet to carry out good and fast research, and to support your business in many ways. I believe there has never been a better time to start up new small businesses.

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Why Your Business Plan Won’t Make You Rich Or Famous

June 27th, 2011

Searching Amazon.com for business plan books provides over 36,000 results. Few other areas of the business section in Borders is so crowded. Why is this? I believe it is because somehow business owners think that if they have a good enough business plan, they can convince investors to give them money and make their business successful.

Entrepreneurs just like you are constantly seeking the silver bullet of “the perfect business plan” that will get them financing and bring them to the promised land of business fortunes. I have some bad news for you if that is what you are looking for. A plan, no matter how good it is, will not make you rich or successful.

If running a successful business was as easy as writing a plan, very few businesses would fail. Current statistics show that the more than half of all new businesses fail in their first two or three years. This is not news. The majority of businesses have been failing since the first owner put out a shingle. Why? Bad ideas? Bad execution? Some of both? We do not always know.

What we do know is no business ever failed because it did not have a business plan. A plan on its own has little value. What is valuable, though, is the process of writing a business plan. Writing a business plan forces you to put into words all of the ideas and concepts of your business. It leads you to examine your financing, marketing, competition, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT). This excellent process will increase your chances of having a long-term successful business. That is what you are really looking for. If you have that, investors are easy to find.

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Get Local Media Coverage For Your Small Business – 7 Strategic Steps

June 23rd, 2011

Having your business featured in the local media can feel like getting lucky at the roulette table. The wheel spins round and round and you just pray that tiny ball lands on your number so your story is one of the chosen few to receive coverage that day. It is seen as a big bonus because you’re basically getting free advertising, and the people absorbing that content are active viewers, listeners and readers.

So how do you get your local newspapers, TV and radio stations to take notice of your company? You’ve been sending out press releases when you launch a new product or have an event, you’ve been calling to follow up, but nothing seems to work.

Let’s take a look at some simple suggestions for getting your story in the local news.

1. Know Your Current Events

This is first on the list for a reason. You may have heard it before because it truly is the most important factor. Connecting your small business to a current event is the easiest way to get some media attention.

When you’re looking for stories to pitch, think about local, state, national and even international news. Most local media outlets include national and international news in their broadcasts or publications. They are always looking for ways to connect the local community to “the big story.”

Remember…most news is not good news. That means you’re going to have to be willing to participate in stories that may not give you the glowing coverage you’d hoped for.

In most cases, the saying “any publicity is good publicity” is right on. You just have to find a way to be positive about what could be viewed as negative circumstances.

For instance – what is your restaurant doing about that huge recall on lettuce? Is your ski shop still making sales despite the warm winter weather? Will you be hiring fewer seasonal employees this summer because of the slow economy?

Staying up to date on the news means you’ll be ready when an opportunity to attach your small business to a big story arises. If you get a request for an interview without asking for it, make sure you brush up on the topic beforehand. That way you’ll look smart!

2. Look for Unique Stories to Tell

Chances to connect your business to a news story won’t come around every day, but media outlets are always on the look-out for human interest stories, sometimes called “fluff pieces” in the industry.

These are the feel-good stories that everyone loves to watch. If you can get the media to bite on a story like this, it’s like striking oil! You may not make the front page or get coverage at the top of a newscast, but you can bet they’ll tease the pants off it so that people stick around.

Is your company sending anything – or better yet – anyone to help with the latest disaster relief? Are you doing anything to help families in need over the holidays? If someone who works for you is a member of the military and has been deployed, let the media know about send-off parties and how you plan to support the employee.

It may sound like tooting your own horn (and you are), but that’s the way it works. By the way, if you can pitch a story relating your business to puppies, kittens or babies – you’re in for sure. I’m not joking!

3. Appear as Professional as Possible

When a newsroom gets a press release that’s full of typos and blatant errors, it not only gets eye rolls it also means you lose credibility. When possible, have more than one person proofread your news release before it’s sent out.

A stylish looking press release can go a long way. You may want to consider putting together an entire media packet inside of custom presentation folders. That way you can include extra background information on your company, DVDs, business cards and more along with your release. You can order presentation folders online and personalize them with your company’s logo and marketing message.

Pitching your story inside an attractive marketing folder means you’re going to get a closer look than a plain press release that gets spit out of the fax machine. Plus, showing up in person to hand over your material could lead to valuable connections inside the local media.

It’s also important to write a headline and sub-header for your press release that is attention-getting and makes the reader want to learn more. This makes it obvious to the people in the media how attractive your story could be to an audience.

4. Understand the Newsroom Hierarchy and Make Relationships

Any working relationship you have in the media can prove to be valuable. Most newsrooms have all sorts of employees suggesting story ideas at editorial meetings, which are usually held a couple of times a day. Many times reporters and producers are looking for a story to recommend, and if you give them an idea, you’re actually being helpful.

However, not every position in the newsroom carries the same amount of weight.

You may think that if you have an “in” with the news director or chief/managing editor your story will be on the top of the list. That’s not always the case. News directors are busy people, and some are more hands on than others. You should realize that if you’re only e-mailing your story idea to the news director or editor in chief – you could be getting overlooked.

Reporters, producers and the editors of particular sections of a newspaper or magazine are good connections because they’re pitching stories on a regular basis. How much influence they have in a newsroom will vary depending on the individual.

Reporters are obviously the people putting together featured packages for the news. Their stories are the centerpieces of newspapers and newscasts. Developing relationships with reporters could mean you’re the first person they think of when it’s time to cover something related to your industry.

Producers and editors are the ones making a majority of the content decisions. They’ll likely decide where your story appears in the paper or airs in a broadcast. Many of them are also writing copy, and oversee photography choices or video editing.

One of the more influential positions in a TV newsroom is the assignment desk – sometimes called assignment editor or assignment manager. This is the person who organizes all the scheduled events, keeps a close ear on the scanner for breaking news, answers a lot of phone calls for news tips, sets up interviews and much more. The assignment desk is sort of like the central nervous system of the newsroom. Getting your story idea to whoever is sitting at that desk should be your No. 1 goal.

5. Give the Media Monster What it Wants

The Media Monster is hungry. It’s also a picky eater. You need to feed it some delicious treats.

Words are powerful, but a picture is worth a thousand words. Having opportunities for good video or photographs is extremely important. If the story you pitch has a good visuals for video, the rest of your bases should be covered. Good video means eye-catching still pictures and usually interesting audio as well.

If your company is holding an Easter egg hunt for kids, don’t invite the media for interviews during the ice cream social afterwards.

If you’re holding an event with a special speaker, the least you can do is make sure there’s interesting stuff to shoot inside the room. That might mean you have to make some signage with logos, photos, charts and graphs. Then you can set up some displays for the camera guy (or girl) to shoot. Don’t feel guilty about manufacturing photo and video opportunities for the media. Politicians have been doing it for decades.

It’s a smart idea to indicate on your release a time and location where media representatives can find the best photo/video opportunities. When the Media Monster’s belly is full of tasty video, scrumptious pictures, and delectable audio he’ll be happy and will come back for more.

6. Buy Advertising

This sounds a little shady, but it really is the way things happen. Becoming a regular advertiser in the local media usually means they’ll turn to you when there’s a story relating to the products or service your business provides.

Of course, buying ads or becoming a sponsor doesn’t guarantee you’ll get coverage. You’re not actually paying for that. Buying advertising won’t necessarily make you a favorite among the folks in the newsroom, but if a sales rep hears the newsroom is planning a story on the scorching heat, he may suggest the reporter contacts your air conditioning repair business.

If there is a story in the works about how road construction is affecting local businesses, your shoe store could be the first place that comes to mind because your full-page ad has been running in the paper. Some newsrooms even have lists of local businesses that are also sponsors so reporters call them first when covering certain topics.

7. Be Flexible and Respectful

You may think your schedule is jam-packed, but the people who work in television, radio and print have extremely tight deadlines to meet. In most cases, they’ve got one work day to turn around their story. But you have until next week to finish your little Power Point presentation.

Trying to reschedule an interview for a later date can be a big hassle. Usually these interviews only take around 15 minutes, so find the time in your day to talk to reporters if they request an interview. If you can’t do it yourself, find someone else in your company who can.

It is also important to have some manners when dealing with the media. Working in news can be a stressful job. Would you want to call the mother whose son was just murdered for an interview? Would want to shoot video of deadly car crashes day after day?

Sometimes people get annoyed with those pesky reporters and photographers. Just remember that newsrooms are very social places. If you act like a jerk to the photographer, everyone at your local paper or TV station is going to hear about it, and so could many other people at other stations and publications.

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Free Local Business Advertising Ideas

June 19th, 2011

If you are looking for affordable small business marketing ideas, the internet has a great deal to offer. Even if people are not buying your products or services on line, most people now do their research there first, before going out to shop. This is especially true for more expensive items. There is also an increasing use of smartphones with map features when people are out and about. If you can make it easier for customers who are looking for what you have to offer to find your website, this can only be good for your business. Here are a few free local business advertising ideas that require only minimal technical know-how to implement.

Put your business on the map!
Often internet search results will include map results near the top of the listings. Google Places, Bing Local Listings or Yahoo Local are all useful in getting your business higher up your clients search results pages, and adding your business to these listings is effectively completely free local business advertising!

Is your website search locatable?
If you’re a local business providing a service for local customers, your physical address is a major part of what many potential customers are likely to be searching for. Your website needs to include your address, ideally on every page. You could include it in a footer for example. It is also worth including a paragraph on your website that lists nearby locations also served, so you’ll have a chance of appearing in those locations too. If you have a testimonials page, you could include the location of the customer in the testimonial heading too. This all helps the internet search engines bring people looking for exactly what you have to offer, directly to your website.

Can Facebook work for your business?
Small business marketing includes everything to do with engaging with your customers, and Facebook is now the largest social media site with over 500 Million users, that is one in every 13 people on earth! It is not just for youngsters anymore either, 30% of Facebook users are in the over 35 demographic, and this segment is growing! This is a place where a lot of your potential customers hang out, chat with their friends, and go to get news and information.

Having a Facebook page for your business is a great way for you to engage with customers and potential customers, and if your posts are interesting, funny, or both they are more likely to ‘like’ your business page in order to see more posts from you, and this will keep you in their minds. Your Facebook page should contain a summary of what’s great about your business, and a link through to your main website. Try to make the page interesting and personal, rather than focused on your sales pitch. Facebook is a place to be sociable, and if you think about the way you communicate on there as if you were in a real life social situation with all your potential customers you won’t go far wrong.

It is advisable to think carefully about how you use the site; people do not react well to overt selling on Facebook any more than they would react well if you walked up to them at a party and started selling straight away before they had got to know you at all. People are more likely to buy from you if they know, like and trust you. Mix in occasional posts about your business, offers etc. with a larger proportion of interesting and personal posts about yourself, and share snippets of your expertise relating to your business too. Try to be as open, transparent and honest as you can. The internet is a very public place and people will soon see through any attempt at deception.

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A Quick Guide to Government Grants For Small Businesses

June 16th, 2011

Government grants for small businesses are a great way to get the money to fund your start up!

How many times have you had a great business idea, but no start up capital? If you’re not already an entrepreneur, or related to one, you might not even know anyone with the money or contacts to money that could help you.

You could try going to a bank, but if you don’t have some sort of collateral, you’re probably out of luck–especially in today’s economic climate.

Besides, you have to pay loans back!

How about the idea of getting a government grant?

What’s so great about government grants is there is money currently available for every possible type of business. More importantly, once you secure the money, you don’t have to pay it back. So, it’s not going to cut into your fledgling business’ profitability.

You can also get grants from private organizations!

I suspect you’ve heard that you have to jump through a lot of hoops to get grants. Well,…that’s actually true. But I’ve got news for you. As an experienced entrepreneur, if you can’t get through the details of a grant application, then entrepreneurship might not be for you.

Really, it’s not all that difficult. If you want to start your business hard enough, you’ll get through it in style.

There are many resources on the Internet you can use to find grants. Two are the Foundation Center and also a site called Grants.gov, which is run by the government as a sort of grant clearinghouse.

The Foundation Center is the nation’s leading authority on philanthropy. Other than hooking you up with non-governmental money sources, they have a number of great online courses you can take that will really help hone your grant application skills.

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Small Business Tips: How To Get Media Coverage

June 11th, 2011

One of the great challenges of being a small business owner is to get noticed in a very crowded marketplace. Getting your name out in front of the pack is one of the key arts that once mastered, will enable your business to grow exponentially. Press releases and media coverage is one of the best ways for your business to get noticed.

But the important questions is… how do you get media coverage.

What most small business owners don’t realise is that it is quite easy to get media coverage if you have a story that will help the media sell their business which is the news and entertainment. Many years ago I started collecting the fuel prices in our local area and released a press release each day stating what was the highest and lowest prices available.

After the first two press releases, one of Townsville’s premiere radio stations and a television station picked up our story and gave us free media coverage on what we were doing. This gave me the opportunity to tell my story and to share what was happening in the local fuel prices. So how did this help our business, well every time I did the story I would make sure I wore my company shirt with our logo plastered all over it and website. This allowed us to associate the story with my company. Over the 2 years we did this we doubled our business so it does certainly work.

The key issue that you need to know about the media is that they are always looking for people to tell an interesting story and if you have an interesting story then you need to share your story with the local media. It doesn’t matter whether you work in a small town or a major capital city, the way you do it is always the same… you have to have a story worthy of the news.

I was recently working with a new Kebab shop and we were looking for new ideas about how to sell his business to the local community and to gain maximum exposure. When I first spoke with the owners, I asked them what were their Unique Selling Point. At the time they didn’t have one, so we developed one. It ended up that we developed a brand new product which was the Worlds Hottest Kebab!

Now if you are going to have a USP like this, then the media will want to know about it. Making a claim like this is something they will investigate, So I worked with him on developing a media release and strategy to get media coverage.

The owner of this shop now has a lot of opportunities to use the USP to get media coverage by promoting to the media fun events such as running the worlds hottest kebab eating competition or crowning the man or woman who has eaten the most of the hottest kebabs as King.

The key lessons you need to learn in getting media coverage is this:

1. Don’t be afraid to send out a media release on anything unique happening in your business

2. Build a relationship with your local media on the things you do

3. If something else is happening in the media, share your thoughts and comments with them

4. Never be afraid of media coverage, the more people who hear about your business the more that are likely to buy from you.

5. Never send out a media release simply selling a product. However if you are launching a brand new product that will change the world then this is something that the media will want to know about.

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How Can I Get the Word Out Fast About My Small Business?

June 8th, 2011

What is the best way to advertise your business? As an entrepreneur, you want your product, service, or business idea to reach your target market as soon as possible.

The fastest way to market is to use the Internet. Online marketing reaches more people around the world quicker than traditional marketing campaigns. As a business owner, you can choose between paid or free marketing strategies that suit your budget. To get the word out about your business consider implementing some or all of these online marketing initiatives:

1. Get Found with Search Engine Optimization

- Get you business website on the first pages of search engine listings by optimizing for the search engines and web directories.
- Index your website for it to be found easily by search engines. Include text navigation and a sitemap for proper website indexing.
- Create useful content. People search online to get information. Give it to them with informative and relevant content.
- Build links from your website to other websites. Great content encourages linkage. Join the online communities of users and experts, such as forums and discussion boards.
- Optimize each webpage. Every page should have a relevant URL address and appropriate Meta tags. If there are images in the page, use Alt-tagging and write descriptive text attributes. Use title and header tags (h1, h2, h3) that describe the page accurately. All these SEO tactics are considered in search engine rankings.

2. Build a Business Blog

- Complement your website with a blog that delivers updates about your business, products and services regularly.
- Link your blog and your website for wider audience coverage for your business.
- Post interesting content in your blog, such as informative articles, current news and events, trends and studies. You can also interview experts and invite guest bloggers to write in your blog.
- Widen your blog’s coverage through social media networking. Link each blog post to the social media platforms you have joined, such as LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, etc. Incorporate share links to allow blog readers to share your posts to their social media sites. Share services like Addthis.com makes make link share possible.
- Incorporate an email opt-in form in your blog to gather readers’ email addresses. You can then include these addresses in your email marketing campaigns.

3. Get the Message Out with Email

- Include your business logo, company slogan or email signature with every email message you send. You can also place your social media profile links. These provide your identity and contact details.
- Create a good quality email layout that you use every time you send out your message. The design should include your brand identity and social media links. Choose your theme, colors, fonts and graphics carefully to match your brand and that appeal to your subscribers.
- Utilize social media campaigns to increase your email subscriptions. For example, place an email sign-up feature with each free newsletter you post to Twitter or with each promotional contest on your Facebook fan page.

4. Build Business Connections at LinkedIn

- Establish your business profile at LinkedIn to network with other business professionals and share valuable information and ideas. Place as much information about your business in your profile to attract more clients.
- Create or join groups related to your business niche or industry. This gives more exposure to your business and provides you information on trends, customers and products of your fellow group members.
- Use the News section at LinkedIn to automatically broadcast from your blog RSS. This allows your LinkedIn contacts to get visibility of your blog.
- Explore new business opportunities by using LinkedIn’s search engine and research tools.

5. Engage Fans with a Facebook Page

- Tap into Facebooks’ big user database by creating a fan page for your business. Place unique and useful information into the fan page.
- Promote your fan page by sharing the page link to other social media sites and through email.
- Place fresh content in your fan page by writing on your fan page wall regularly. Setup an RSS feed from your blog to automatically deliver content to your page whenever your blog is updated.
- Encourage email subscriptions by setting up an email opt-in form in your fan page.
- Join industry groups or become a fan of industry pages. Share posts from these groups in your fan page. Comment on postings actively.
- Post your business’ promotional campaigns in your fan page. This encourages fans to share your page with their friends.

6. Launch Your Business Presence on Twitter

- Create your profile on Twitter, making sure to place complete information about your business.
- Follow people you know at Twitter by using the Twitter search engine or by using your email contacts.
- Tweet regularly and in a conversational tone, to engage followers.
- Link your blog to your Twitter account using tools like HootSuite or Twitterfeed to automatically tweet any updates in your blog.
- Search for your company using Twitter’s search engine and find out who talks about your business or products. Reply to tweets about your business and thank these tweeters for mentioning you.
- Organize your Twitter following by groups. Click on each group to get a pulse of their topics. Join conversations if you can.

7. Advertise with Pay Per Click (PPC)

- Research the different PPC search engines and decide on the one that suits you. Your choice can be based on the costs involved or your planned level of involvement in managing the PPC campaign.
- Choose relevant keywords for your PPC ad campaign. These keywords can come from your marketing campaigns, or the search terms that visitors use to find your website. Review your social networks and study how customers, fans and followers refer to your product or website. How they refer to you can be the relevant keywords for your PPC ad.
- Include attractive business offers in your ad copy, such as price discounts, free shipping or other similar promos.
- Test different keywords when conducting ad campaigns, to see which gets more performance benefits. Use your PPC provider’s tracking tools, such as Google AdWords’ Quality Score, to monitor the performance of your keywords.
- Optimize the landing pages of your website. Your keyword-driven PPC ads should link to the most appropriate land page URL of your website. Consider revising the landing pages if they are not matched with your ads.
- Use negative keywords in your ad to exclude target users that are not matched to your marketing strategy. For example, the negative keyword “-free” can be used to prevent users from seeing your ad, if they are searching for free products and your campaign is not giving out freebies.

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Easy Home Business Ideas Anyone Can Start Up

June 5th, 2011

Whether you are tired of your job or just looking or a change of pace, becoming your own boss is both exciting and terrifying. For those just starting out in the home business world, you will want a job that makes you money, takes very little capital to get going, but also earns you profits you can actually live off of. To help get you started, here are a few easy home business ideas anyone can do with just a few bucks.

Auction
Start your own auction site. Buy and sell products through your site that include art work, books or even toys. For this you will need a business license as well as a website, which on average will cost a home business owner $80 to $150 to start up.

Daycare
Love kids? Then daycare is a great way to make money and work from home. Most parents looking to start a daycare in their home will need to contact the local child care agencies about getting a license and having your home inspected, but the good news is, these types of jobs can make you $20 per day per child.

Sell on Amazon or eBay
Selling books and junk you find from garage sales can pay off big with sites like Amazon or eBay. For this type of job you need to know what items are actually valuable, learn to price them and auction them. There is a fee to sell on both sites, so factor that into each item you sell.

Take Surveys
This is not something you can make a full-time living off, but there are many home business gurus that use surveys to bring in a little extra money. Survey sites pay some of their takers up to $200 per month just to take a few surveys each month.

Sell a Craft
If you are good at making t-shirts, jewelry or even artwork, consider selling your crafts online through your own website or other sites like eBay and Etsy.

Customer Service Jobs
Believe it or not, you can make $700 or more per month as a customer service representative from home. Companies like Alpine Access and West at Home hire contractors to take customer service calls from the comfort of their own home. For these jobs you will need a home computer, high speed internet and telephone line before you can apply to the job.

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Google and Small Business Internet Marketing

May 28th, 2011

Small business Internet marketing requires attention to how well your site ranks with Google. A site that is ignored by Google or ranked very poorly will not get the benefit of any of the millions of people who use Google each day. In other words, those millions use Google every day to find the websites they want to use, and websites that don’t rank well with Google aren’t discovered by those people.

Google Internet Marketing

Google is such an important part of Internet marketing that most online marketing efforts are devoted to ranking well with this search engine king. Though there are other large search engines out there, most of them rank websites similarly to the way Google ranks them. This has made the Google search engine marketing methods the standard among marketers. If you can optimize your site for Google, you will likely build a good ranking with the other search engines as well.

Getting links to your website, including links coming from sites that are well ranked by Google, is an important part of the process. The quality of the links is an important deciding factor in how well Google will rank your website. Links from prestigious sites that have attracted plenty of links are the best kind. Article directories with high ranking are useful, as are more prestigious sites like news sites.

Online Business Opportunity

Because Google is so pervasive online, it presents one of the best online business opportunities. Once you understand how important Google is and how to use it to bring in a high volume of traffic, there is no stopping your website. Capturing a spot on the first page or two of Google can potentially drive millions of people to your website.

No matter what your business idea is, using Google in your plan is the key to low-cost marketing that has the best traffic-driving potential. Every niche is served by Google, and a rise in traffic levels can only enhance your conversion rate. And, Google traffic is automatically targeted traffic because it is led by users who are seeking the keywords that you have on your website. So, the traffic that ends up on your site is made up of people who were searching for exactly what you have to offer.

Making Money From Home

Making money from home is largely an automated process once you have a website in place that is Google friendly. With your online business that is firmly entrenched in search engine results, you have the opportunity to make money from home every day. This money can be brought in through sales made on the website that don’t require any further work from you as the site owner.

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