 |
 |
|
   |
|
 Issue #12 - December 16th, 2002 Internet Marketing Newsletter for Small Businesses
Brought to you by idesignbusiness.com http://www.idesignbusiness.com Issue #12 Monday, December 16th, 2002 In this Issue: ARTICLES: FREE RESOURCE: Welcome to issue #12 of the Internet Marketing Newsletter for Small Businesses. This is the final issue of 2002, thanks to everyone that has subscribed this year. I hope you have enjoyed the newsletter. I encourage reader feedback, let me know what topics you would like covered in 2003. Please direct all newsletter correspondence to newsletters@idesignbusiness.com * Special Announcement * I am excited to tell you about a new service idesignbusiness launched last week - The idesignbusiness Mail Manager. It is a complete email marketing solution designed to help small and home-based businesses communicate with customers & prospects. We handle everything for you including email collection, contact list management, email delivery, and reporting. To learn more about the Mail Manager and how it can benefit your business, click here and view the online tour. You can view all past issues of the Internet Marketing Newsletter for Small Businesses at the newsletter archive. Click below to visit the archive: Newsletter Archive Neal St. Clair idesignbusiness Advertisement Protect Your Business! Stop viruses and keep your PC safe with McAfee VirusScan software! When you're surfing the Internet, there's more to worry about than just viruses. VirusScan software destroys threats at all entry points to your PC including email, the Internet, and even synchronization with your PDA. VirusScan includes extra firewall protection to keep your computer safe from Internet-based threats. ARTICLE "Build It and They Will Come" - Destroying the Myth There is a common myth on the Internet of "If I build it they will come," and it is time to end that belief right now! How many of you have spent a lot of effort (and money) building a website for your company, getting it live on the web, and then becoming frustrated and disappointed because no one is visiting it? I know I have, and many small business owners have shared their frustration with me over the years. The truth is that the best design and the coolest technology will not attract visitors to your website. What's important is spending time on promoting your website and letting people know it exists. Don't get me wrong, having a professional looking website is important but it doesn't matter much if no one is visiting your site to see it! Don't give up hope! There are ways to get more than a handful of people to your website each week and I will show you how. The best advice I can give any business owner trying to promote their business online is to use a variety of web marketing tools in tandem. Submitting your website to search engines and relying on them to drive hundreds and thousands of people to your site is not enough anymore. If you are struggling to get more than 5-10 people to look at your website a day, then you owe it to yourself (and your website) to explore some of the web-marketing tools I have included below. I have only included methods that are affordable on a small business budget. (In fact, most of these tools will cost you nothing but your time) Search Engine Marketing If you have a website, or are thinking about creating one, it is imperative that you develop a Search Engine Marketing strategy. Search Engines have become so commonplace on the Internet that no website can ever hope to generate any significant traffic without them. Check out back issues of this newsletter to find helpful articles on developing an effective search engine strategy for your website. If you would like specific tips on ways to improve your search engine presence, please click here to submit your website for our free search engine analysis. Email Marketing Throughout the years, more and more web marketing tools have emerged, some have stuck and others haven't, but the one thing that has remained effective is email marketing. Email marketing works because it is direct and instant. Email allows you to easily send you message to 100, or 1,000 contacts and the results can be immediate. It is the most affordable way to stay in touch with past customers, communicate with your website visitors, and generate leads for your business. If you are not currently using Email to market you products and services, now is the time to start! Click here to learn more about email marketing and how it can benefit your business. e-Newsletters e-Newsletters are becoming more and more common on the Internet and that is because they work. They are a great tool to attract new users to your website, influence repeat visitors, and promote your products and services. The one thing all good e-Newsletters have in common is original and relevant content. A proven way to attract users to your website and keep them coming back is content. Provide information that is useful to your target market and they will keep coming back for more. e-Newsletters are a great way to distribute original content related to your business. For more information on creating an e-Newsletter for your website, Click here. Affiliate Programs If you sell products and/or services directly from your website than an affiliate program will help you increase traffic and sales from your website. You offer links to your products and services for other websites to promote. In exchange for every lead or sale you get from one of your affiliate websites, you pay them a commission. There are many services that help you setup and run an affiliate program. Click here to read a past article specifically about affiliate programs. Banner Exchanges Banner exchanges can work great to generate traffic to your website and they don't cost a thing...BUT there is a catch. In order for a banner exchange to really help your business you need to already be receiving significant traffic. Here's how it works, you post banners on your website promoting other businesses that are part of the program. Every time someone visits your website and opens a page where you are displaying one of the banners, your banner gets displayed on someone else's website. Keep in mind this only means your banner is being displayed, there is no guarantee that someone will click on it. I recommend joining a banner exchange program once you implement some of the other tools discussed above and your traffic begins to pick up. I hope this article was helpful and provides you some different ideas on marketing your business online. I am sure as you begin to develop different online marketing programs in tandem you will see a significant increase to your web traffic. Happy Holidays! Advertisement Are you using email campaigns to market you products and services, communicate with customers, and generate leads? If not, you are missing out on the most affordable and effective marketing tool available to small businesses. The idesignbusiness Mail Manager handles everything required to execute a professional email marketing campaign including email collection, contact list management, email delivery, and reporting. Learn how you can begin sending e-Newsletters, greeting cards, email promotions and more today. FREE RESOURCE: Each issue of the Internet Marketing Newsletter for Small Businesses will include helpful free online resources to promote your website. Last week I found a very helpful website that I wanted to share with you. MarketLeap.com provides a suite of free tools to help you determine how your website is performing in Search Engines. You can quickly and easily check your website's Link Popularity, verify what keywords you are appearing for in Search Engines, and determine your search engine saturation. It is important to benchmark how your website is performing in search engines at a certain point in time and then continually check to measure your progress. ABOUT idesignbusiness idesignbusiness provides Web marketing and technology solutions for small businesses. We utilize a combination of consulting and technology expertise to create customized and flexible solutions. Please visit http://www.idesignbusiness.com for more information. SUBSCRIPTION NOTICE This newsletter is only sent to opt-in subscribers. If at anytime you would like to be removed from this list, please send an email to newsletters@idesignbusiness.com with REMOVE in the subject line. Spread the word - Please forward to friends and colleagues. Copyright 2002 - idesignbusiness.com http://www.idesignbusiness.com |
 |
 |
|
Contact | Home | Site Map © Copyright 2001 - 2005 idesignbusiness |