The Importance Of CMS In Small Business Online Marketing

Small business online marketing continues to grow with the every increasing number of people who come to rely on the internet. Many people in this business ask the important question – what is CMS? The answer is simply that it is a Content Management System used by many of today’s websites. It allows users to be able to edit the content of their website without having any programming knowledge. Depending on the CMS or Content Management System, the extent in which the user is able to edit their content can vary.

CMS will not only help website owners edit content, but it can also help them improve their search engine ranking. If you have a website that is outdated, then the content on it can also become outdated. When this happens, search engines will tend to not rank your site very high. There are other important considerations when choosing the best CMS to use in your business. After a consultation with your website designer it will be easier to choose the CMS that will best meet your needs.

It is essential to realize how CMS can play a role in your website’s success. Content management systems can vary from one system to another. It is also important to understand how much editing you will need to do on your site. Additionally, you need to consider if you will need to edit just pages, or you will need to edit the menu, layout design, footer, etc. If you already have some experience or knowledge of CSS or HTML, then this can be a distinct advantage.

Why CMS?

It is important to understand what types of CMS are currently being used. There are CMS open management sources, such as Joomla and WordPerss; these are used by numerous agencies and website designers. When you choose an open source CMS, you have the ability to change your website host whenever you choose. If you use a proprietary system, your site should be hosted with that company.

Adding an Application to a Website

When using a CMS website, you will be able to add a variety of different applications without having to go into the programming of your site. These applications might include video players, a catalogue or even galleries. You can also add these third party applications using either a proprietary or open source CMS to increase your site’s efficiency.

HTML/CSS or Flash Sites

There can be many benefits to either of these types of sites. With flash CMS, you can have the flexibility to customize your site and easily make design changes. It can also add some interactivity to your site; however, your site will generally be slower than if it used HTML and it is more difficult for search engines to read.

HTML/CSS require a good understanding of programming. Content such as video, images or some third party applications will be difficult to edit on your own. You will typically need the help of a web designer to make these changes.

SEO Friendly Sites

It is extremely important that you have a website that is compatible with today’s search engine optimization. If your site has a great deal of flash, it will not be easy for the search engines to access the content. Your site should always have content in HTML in order for search engines to be able to read it. Your sites description, meta tags, site and page titles will also help it rank higher in the search engines.

You can easily get a good template design for a website using CMS. You will also be able to rebuild your site or edit content easily using CMS. When it comes to small business online marketing, CMS provides a solution. Now you can have a high quality web design by using the best CMS available.

Find out more from Web Design Melbourne company NetBlots.

Read more!

Why online marketing is a smart investment for your small business

The reach of internet and social media is increasing daily and so will your business if you make the right choices when investing in online marketing. It is no secret that starting a business is hard, one of the most challenging tasks that start up and small businesses face is promoting your business and getting your name out there. Choosing online marketing as a promotional tool for your business can make that task a little easier.

What is online marketing?

Simply put, online marketing is the promotion of services and products over the internet. There are a many types of internet marketing, some of which include

Display advertising

placing ads on a third party website to increase awareness of your business and direct traffic to your business's website.

Social media marketing

increasing traffic and awareness of your website through social media websites such as Facebook, Twitter & LinkedIn.

Search Engine Marketing

promoting your business's website by increasing visibility on search engine result pages through paid and free techniques, for example paid placements or SEO.

Email marketing

directly marketing your business through email

Why online marketing?

Marketing is crucially important for any type of business however many small business do not have a huge marketing budget. Online marketing offers a relatively inexpensive solution compared to traditional more costly marketing mediums. Moreover, with online marketing, statistics can be measured easily and inexpensively which will allow you determine which online marketing tools are doing the most for your small business, therefore maximising the value of your dollar. Although many online marketing tools are designed to increase the visibility and traffic of your website, in the hands of a professional marketing company it will also help you shape your business's corporate identity.

Getting started

Perhaps the easiest way to begin marketing your small business online is to consult a professional marketing company, especially if your business doesn't have a website yet as having an appealing and functional website is a very powerful marketing tool and is essential for every business in the internet era. A professional marketing company can provide your business with an online marketing expert who will help you choose which marketing tools are right for you and integrate them into your business's overall marketing plan. When choosing a online marketing company it is useful to do some research about them, having a look at their portfolio and most importantly ensure they understand the marketing needs of your business.

Read more!

Small Business Online Marketing--Yahoo Search Marketing

With the rise in contextual-based advertising, small businesses can gain a significant advantage over competitors in similar niche markets. With benefits of keyword bidding and quality rankings, your business can gain prominence and visibility in the top search engines. Yahoo! search engines, although a rivaling second to Google as a search site, still offers plenty of options fro context-driven advertising and managing an effective e-marketing campaign. Yahoo! Search Marketing offers a wide range of products and services that can meet the needs of any budget.

Sponsored search is the fresh wave of online marketing, allowing you, the small business owner, to pay for placement with a well-strategized plan. Yahoo! Search Marketing as we know it today was an acquisition of Overture; it was the place to go when for evaluating the price of keywords available for bidding at any given time, and finding the best keywords for your website overall. Recently, Yahoo! shifted gears to a ranking system for determining value, rather than bidding only. This takes into account the performance and historical data of keywords and combinations, offering a more targeted approach based on quality (very similar to Google's concept).

What's Available with Yahoo! Search Marketing

The key offerings of using Yahoo! Search marketing include:Sponsored search optionsLocal advertisingSearch submissions on multiple listing sitesYahoo! Shopping portal exposureYahoo! Travel portal exposureDirectory submissions on Yahoo! directory

Packages vary based on your small business needs; most small business owners will find the local advertising segment especially helpful in targeting a specific market. This can help target the prospects you need in your neighborhood only, maximizing your marketing dollars with very little effort.

Sponsored Search allows you to place our business in the top, light blue boxes found on search listings. This is considered one of the key areas where visitors are likely to click, and can help you boost your search engine ranking visibility immediately. Promotional options allow you to target specific zones and territories where this will appear.

Yahoo! Local can drive customers in your neighborhood directly to your business listing. Similar to Google Maps listings, Yahoo! local will help you get a higher placement specific to your location. It's a good way to target a market and attract visitors who are more likely to visit an offline presence as well. The search algorithms are configured using zipcodes and keywords, making the results more targeted and better refined. The difference between Yahoo and Google in this area is that Google will allow advertisers to show ads on specific geographic regions, while Yahoo depends solely on Search Local listings. If you want the Google-influenced targeting strategy, Yahoo! does offer Geotargeting. This can narrow down your distribution to specific states, cities, or neighborhoods.

Search Submit is a powerful tool on Yahoo! Search Marketing campaigns, allowing you to simultaneously submit to additional search engines such as AltaVista and AlltheWeb,iVillage, and CNN.com. Results will appear below the sponsored search box, and ranking will depend on the traffic quantity and links to your website. You'll also be submitted to Yahoo!'s business search engines. Yahoo! also features a handful of Search Submit resellers: iNeedHits.com, InfoSpider, MarketLeap, PositionTech, and Trellian can help you improve your content and page ranking to be more compliant with search engine submission procedure.

Yahoo! Shopping and Yahoo! Travel portals are high-traffic destination websites that can offer you some strong customer leads on a regular basis. Listing and advertising on these partner sites might just help your small business receive some extra visibility, especially if you have a product or service relating to any niche topics in these industries. The great thing about your appearance on these networks is that they are visitied by otivated sellers. These people are already in ‘shopping mode,' and may be more likely to click on your links or products if they are readily available. Yahoo! Shopping buyer's guides can highlight a product for your business, and link out to your website in a professional and attractive format. If you retail multiple products, setting up a Yahoo! Store can give you an additional extension of your business. Both the shopping and travel portals offer pay-er-performance programs, so you'll only be paying for advertising once it is clicked. This gives you an easy way to track the effectiveness of each campaign.

If you decide to include your business on Yahoo! Directory, you can choose from both sponsored and regular listings to boost your traffic through exposure. According to Yahoo!'s website, over 330 million unique users tap into Yahoo! directory on a regular basis, and your site would appear as a formal directory listing under the right category. This is a great way for your small business to prmote its online presence under a formal category and index.

Benefits of Yahoo! Search Marketing

Yahoo! Search Marketing differs from contenders such as Google and Microsoft AdCenter in a few distinct ways. The key benefits of Yahoo's search program include:SimplicityEase of use and overall functionalityEasy keyword selection through the Overture keyword tools available (and they're free)Low levels of competitor saturation of specific keyword combinationsRecommendations of similar keywords through OvertureLower overall costs for niche keywords and new topicsUse of the Quality Index that takes into account the ad's historical performance and expected performance

How ‘Quality Ranking' Is Determined

Yahoo's recent updates to Yahoo! Search Marketing have identified the use of a Quality Index. This is a combination of:

Conversion data availableHistorical resultsKeywords in the URLKeywords in the landing ageKeywords in the heading and titlesThe bidding or click priceComparison of price on other advertising sites

Maximizing Your Small Business Marketing Budget With Yahoo! Search Marketing

The best ways you can make the most of your Yahoo! search marketing campaign dollars is to focus on sponsored listings and choose the Local options if you have an offline presence. These strategies will make it much easier to reach higher page rankings, and gain the visibility you need. In addition, you'll need to develop your website and content with a few things in mind. You can:

Make sure keywords are contained in your title tagScatter keywords throughout your landing pageTake advantage of ‘dayparting' where you can run more or less ads during particular parts of the dayTest different landing pages to see what worksUse keywords in the landing page URLTake advantage of naming a domain name with high keyword rankings

Costs for Small Businesses

Yahoo! Search Marketing options can prove to be a valuable extension of your online marketing campaign, especially if you are on a limited budget. Your small business can open an account for just $5, and package rates depend on:

The number of directories you want to submit toSponsored search vs. regular listingsBanner advertising purchasesGeotargeting vs. general exposureKeywords selected

The value of pay per performance marketing initiatives is your ability to control your budget; you can start with as little as $50 per month or as much as $1,000. How much you invest will largely depend on your conversion rates. You'll need to calculate what your conversion rate is before even beginning a formal campaign. The conversion rate is the amount you can afford to pay a potential customer to visit your site, and turning that into an actual sale. If the price is higher than the profit you would make, your marketing efforts will be wholly ineffective.

After you've determined a budget, registering for an account is as simple process. Yahoo! will approve your account in as little as 24 hours, and you can start creating the listing immediately. You'll need to track the visitors and results of your campaign on a regular basis, and have the freedom to adjust the amount you've invested at any time.

Your small business can benefit from Yahoo! Search Marketing in many ways when you:Outline specifically what you are looking forMonitor your progress frequentlyAdjust the program each month until you see some consistency

Read more!

Online Marketing Funnels for Small Businesses

As a business, you should never be happy with building a webpage for sales, then leaving it to do what it can. You should always be tweaking until you get the best converting page possible.

To do this, internet marketers use something called Split Testing, which essentially means creating two slightly different versions of a web page and randomly sending the incoming traffic to either version, then measuring the outcomes to see which version is better.

A simple example of this is if you have a landing page with an 'enter your email to subscribe now' button, as the main conversion point for your page. Just building a single page like this and looking at the analytics might show you that, in any given day, 100 people hit the page, and 13 sign up for your email newsletter. Now, the idea with split testing is to create the identical page, but change one thing. Let's say you change the button text to read 'sign up for our monthly news letter' instead of the 'enter your email to subscribe now'. You set this page up, use a split testing plugin (available for most CMS sites) that randomizes the incoming link to either Page A or Page B, and after a set time you look at the results. You may see that your new button converts 5% more people, or you may see it converts less. Then you move on to other parts of that page like the title or the sales pitch paragraph, or the color of the button, etc.

The basic idea is to optimize your pages to be the best converting possible, because as a business, you should never be happy with just having a website, but strive to make it work for you as well as possible.

Read more!

Simple Tips To Help You With Small Business Online Marketing

Online Marketing Strategy Tip 1: Create a Website

While starting a successful website might seem like a huge task, knowing a few handy hints can help any business get started in the process of small business online marketing. You will want to consider four points to determine the right action to take to get the most out of the new site. Consider purpose, content, useablility and design in order to create a site the is most likely to succedd.

Purpose

The first step to creating a new website should be to consider one's purpose in starting the new site. A site for personal use will be different than one for business. The goals in creating the site should also be considered. A site that is designed for leads will differ from one designed for sales or to showcase products and services. In addition, a site designed to provide additional information to customers about products or services will also differ. A clearly defined purpose makes it easier to create content which is relevant and drives the desired traffic to the site.

Content

The written and visual content of the site can often determine whether a client follows through, so make sure that your content appeals to the right market. Your home page is often the most difficult to create appropriate content. Remember, you only have ten seconds to convince people to visit the rest of the site or lose them. The home page is not the place to brag or place volumes of information about products. The home page should be about the customers and their needs and wants. Be sure to consider the latest SEO ideas as content is written.

Useability

The new site should be easy to use, offer quick load times and provide user interaction. If the site offers too many menus and is difficult to navigate, potential clients will give up and find your competitor's site. Slow loading pages can also lose potential clients. Limit file sizes for optimal loading times.

Design

Designs should be modern and attractive to both you and your target market. The design should have a professional look and needs to stay up to date with current trends. A good designer can help in these areas. The design needs to be clean, on a light colored background. Never use a reverse test where the text is lighter than the background as it becomes hard to read.

Once the business owner is clear with these four aspects of small business online marketing, it is important to decide how to put everything together. Your budget may determine if you approach a developer or put the site together on your own. A bad website can often do more harm than good, so be sure to make the most of the available resources for marketing.

Professional web design for small business online marketing may cost anywhere from a few hundred dollars to thousands, depending on several factors. Remember that the site will need constant updating for online success. Good planning can allow owners to reap many business of a successful marketing campaign.

Online Marketing Strategy Tip 2: Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Almost everybody knows that SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. This is an important Internet marketing tool that helps to increase the ranking of websites with major search engines such as Google. It is also the most popular small business online marketing techniques. What most people do not know is that there are many SEO techniques that a person can use to optimize a site. Some of these techniques are very easy to implement and can be done even before SEO experts are called in to offer their expert service. Implementing these strategies will make it easy for the SEO experts to get your website on the first page of Google search results. The following are some factors that you may want to consider when optimizing a site.

Keyword Usage

Choosing the right keyword or keyword phrases is the most important thing in SEO. Without these words or phrases, potential customers will have no way of finding you. Ideally, these words and phrases should appear in header tags, titles, image descriptions or names and the URL of each page.

You should choose keywords that are related to the products or services that you offer in your business. The best keywords are usually those with little or no competition. Ideally, you should avoid keywords that have already been used by larger companies. In order to find the right keywords for your business, you can use Google Keyword tool. This will help you to find keywords that Internet users commonly use when looking for products or services in you specific industry.

Quantity and Quality of Content

While quality may be more important than quantity in some industries, the two are equally important in SEO. Your web-pages should have a large number of well-written content. You should avoid copying pages from other sites as this can lead to blacklisting of your website. For you to compete with larger companies, you should have several interesting pages that rank high with major search engines.

Optimizing Titles

As Internet users browse through your site, they will see titles on the viewer's browser bar on every page. Most people often forget to include this title when creating their websites. Some people will just write the name of their company in that field. This is does not help with SEO. Most top ranking sites have optimized titles on every page. Creating titles for your pages is very easy and does not take a lot of time. There are many companies that offer high quality web design services that might help you with this. Once you have identified the most suitable keywords and phrases for your site, all you have to do is add them to your title bar. It is important that you use keywords that are relevant to the content on that page. This will help to confirm to your readers that they are indeed on the right page. Below is an example of a title that has been optimized:

'Netblots Web design | Melbourne Web design | Melbourne SEO | Flash Webdesign | Internet Marketing Consulting'

Backlinks

Links that point back to your web-pages from other websites are known as backlinks. This can be links from articles or directories linking back to you. However, using directory links that are poor in quality may backfire. Ideally, you should create backlinks from popular sites that are also well known. You should write informative articles that are interesting to read and post them on e-zines, social bookmarking sites and other similar sites. Use links on video tags and descriptions. If you have a n active imagination, there is no limit to the number of ways you can make backlinks work for you.

Read more!

The Role Of CMS In The Small Business Online Marketing Industry

Small business online marketing is flourishing with the number of internet users increasing day by day. It is a very common question asked by many persons related to this business that what is CMS? CMS or Content Management System is a system which is used in reference to various websites. It allows any user to edit the contents of the website without having programming knowledge or software assistance. The extent to which you would like to edit contents varies according to the Content Management System. It provides an alternative to the traditional system in which websites are built by designers and you have to pay each time when you want to edit or add something in your website.

CMS not only helps you to achieve the thing done easily and at cheaper price but also helps you to improve your search engine rank. If your site is outdated then its content will become outdated and it will be harder for search engines to place your website in top rank of search results. You should also consider some other points while seeking the decision for the right CMS for your business. You can choose the CMS according to your need after consulting with your website design agency.

It is very important to realize the capabilities of CMS as it plays an important role in the success of any website. The content management system varies from system to system. You should always know how much you want to edit your websites. These editing may consist of editing your pages, menu, footer, design, etc. If you have prior knowledge of HTML or CSS then it will be an advantage for you. This will help you to have better control over your website and will also help you to get the services at cheaper rates.

Why CMS?

You should have an idea about what CMS is being used as it can be a good thing to know. There many open source Content Management Systems like wordpress and joomla are available which are used by many web designers and agencies. You can go for open source CMS which will provide you the facility to change host your website wherever you like and you can also switch to other host provider. In case of proprietary system, you should host the website with that company and no other host can use the data of that site.

Adding application to websites

With the help of CMS website you can easily add any extra application without much going into the programming details for these applications to your site. It may include catalogue, video players or galleries. You can add with third party application using these open source CMS or proprietary systems which will increase the efficiency of your websites with almost no cost.

You will have to pay some extra amount if you want to want to have more additional pages. It is very good for the website that has an option to add unlimited page without any restriction. It will also provide you the facility to add new menu items.

If you want to sell any product then you should see the things which kind of e-commerce is available through your website. You should consider the important things like payment gateway, full cart facilities and invoicing. Good cart facility feature will add potential to your e-commerce website.

Sites are Flash or HTML/CSS?

There is a lot of benefit to both the type of sites i.e. flash and HTML/CSS. With good flash CMS providers, you will have the good flexibility and customization and you can easily change the design. It will also add interactivity to your website. But, the problem with these sites is that they are slower than HTML sites and are difficult to read by search engines.

On the other hand, if you go for HTML/CSS sites requires good programming knowledge for design and layout. It is not easy for you to edit or add the contents like image, video or some other third party application by yourself. You need to consult a web designer for this purpose. You also need to have a good template design which is very important for a website.

Are sites Search Engine Optimization friendly?

It is very important thing that your website is compatible with SEO or search engine optimization. If you add a lot of flash to your websites content will not be easily available to search engines. You should always have HTML content to able your website read by search engines. You should consider the other points like Meta tags, description and page and site title to ensure that your website is well listed in the top search result on search engines.

If you want to get a template design to your website you can easily get it with CMS without paying. You can also rebuild your website easily with the help of CMS. You can also edit your website yourself. CMS has provided the solution for small business online marketing. You can get high quality web design using best CMS.

For further reading, please visit this Small business online marketing blog.

Read more!

Online Marketing - Don't Forget the Small Things

In the ever changing and demanding world of online marketing and e-commerce, general website maintenance is often overshadowed by big buck industry terms such as Search Engine Optimization and Pay Per Click. While these are proven strategies to increase site traffic and conversion, online marketers all to often wear blinders when it comes to their day-to-day marketing strategies. Here are some important website maintenance pointers to keep in mind when developing your online marketing strategy. Remember this is not an exhausted list rather a guide to help you increase your sites performance.

Stay on top of it - You can bet that your competitors are. From tags to copy, from images to keywords, it is always important to keep your website updated. Keep in mind that it is not just your industry that is changing. Search engines are getting smarter, new forms of marketing avenues are arising and the consumer is becoming more e-savvy. Properly maintaining a website is a full time job that never ends. If I had one area to focus my attention, it would be always having current copy. This will not only assure that your site stays current with consumers trends and changes in the industry, but it will also support your search engine optimization initiatives. Search engines respond well to relevant and fresh copy that relate to your chosen keywords. Adding new content will ensure that your site ranks high and that the bots return more often. Testing is also a good way to make sure you are staying on top of your consumer's needs and wants. Your homepage is a great place to start. You have less than eight seconds to present the information the consumer is looking for in a way that is appealing to them or you will see less than ideal conversions. Your website should be treated like a car. You just fill it with gas and it will only run so long but with regular maintenance and some care, you will ensure that it will be a well oiled machine for years to come.

Don't give up on traditional marketing - Is online marketing a cost effective form of marketing? Of course it is, however it can be less effective if traditional forms of marketing are ignored or discarded. Traditional marketing helps make your online marketing spend as productive as possible. Let's compare it to search engine optimization (SEO) and sponsored search (PPC). Company #1 spends a great deal of time and money optimizing their site for search engines and spends a great deal per month making sure they are always in the first spot for paid search. They are seeing good lead volume for the cost and decide to cut all traditional marketing and just stick to online marketing thinking this will help keep costs down. Firm #2 takes a similar approach but decides to restrict its online marketing spend by ranking in the second or third spot on sponsored search and puts the additional funds towards traditional marketing. Now this raises an interesting question. As a consumer, you are doing a search and see both Firm #1 and Firm #2 rank highly in natural search and Firm #1 is doing a bit better in sponsored search. What happens next is the key to the point that I am making. Your odds of winning that consumers click are much better for Firm #2 because the consumer is already familiar with that brand through traditional marketing. The key is to find the most appropriate balance between your online spend and traditional marketing spend to help insure that you are getting the most out of every marketing dollar.

Find new ways to promote - The effectiveness of your site is based solely on your ability to drive quality visitors to your site and make them convert. We all know this. What we don't realize is that often times our promotional efforts may not directly create conversions. They do however; promote other areas of online marketing such as brand awareness and brand credibility. What is even more striking is that often times your current marketing materials can be leveraged to create more awareness. For example your company sells electronics. As a creative online marketer, you could take that five-minute tutorial about how your product works and post it to YouTube, Yahoo Movies or Google Video. Is this going to increase your conversions by 20 percent? Probably not, what it will do is help gain exposure, create another inbound link for your search engine optimization efforts and most importantly gain awareness for your product and company. Another great tactic is leveraging your sites current content by publishing the content to article databases such as selfgrowth.com. By setting your company apart as an industry expert you gain not only exposure but brand credibility which will pay dividends in terms of conversion. What is so great about leveraging your existing marketing materials is that it is often free. It only costs you and your company time to publish content or posting a movie.

Be patient - Due to the incredible pressure of result driven management, online marketers often do not have the patience to allow their efforts to come to fruition. Let's take for example this scenario. You have just spent four months choosing the correct keywords, optimizing your site for those keywords and just wrapped up another month of online promotion. Now what? Do I just sit and wait? The answer is yes and no. Keep monitoring your sites performance in the search engines and keep promoting your site and updating the freshness of your content. Do not scrap your strategy on the gut feeling that you are not seeing results quickly enough. Improvements in site rankings often take several months as the spiders return, crawl the new content and re-index your site. The key is to continuously make improvements to your site while being patient enough to see the results of your work, time and money.

Remember that online marketing is not just a science; it is an art. Often the sites that get the most attention do not get that way because they spend millions on promotion. They find new and creative ways to drive traffic and convert leads. Stay on top of your website and how it relates to consumers wants and needs. Optimize your traditional and online marketing spend, learn how to leverage current marketing assets and finally be patient. If the basics are covered, the sky is the limit and who knows maybe your site or product will be the next big thing.

Learn more by visiting Spyder Trap Online Marketing

Read more!

Small Business Online Marketing--Microsoft Online AdCenter

As you build your solid marketing plan for your small business, putting your advertising dollars to good use involves some basic research. Keyword-driven advertising has become a popular way to generate streams of traffic to your small business website, and Microsoft Online AdCenter is just one valuable option for startups to gain visibility and instant exposure across different channels.

After you've established the vitals of your marketing strategy--the budget, your target market, the specific products you want to highlight, and your competition-you can tailor an effective marketing campaign using keyword-based advertising. Microsoft Online AdCenter takes it one step further; although it's very similar to Google Adwords in its pay-per-click system, AdCenter offers a more refined and content-targeted initiative. This can help you boost those click through-rates easily and efficiently!

Targeting your online ad program can be tricky; if the service doesn't offer specific features of defining your demographic, or doesn't reach out to the top advertiser networks, your pay-per-click marketing efforts may not bring you the results you need.

Search advertising itself will help your small business reach new and fresh customers with very little effort. When you design your online advertising campaign, selecting a pay-per-click program can help you by:Paying only when people click on the adsBidding for keywords and setting the price you're willing to pay for advertisingTracking clicks that turn into sales, and monitoring these conversion rates to make better decisions in the long termTargeting your customers based on specific customer attributes

So what can Microsoft Online AdCenter provide for your small business for ongoing results?

Key Benefits of Microsoft AdCenter

The top reasons to use Microsoft AdCenter over other services such as Yahoo! Search marketing or Google Adwords programs include:

Increasing bids on specific keywords whenever the ad is seen by a specific group or populationAdvertising frequency and relevancy are fine tuned so that Microsoft's automatic system can identify only the most targeted ads and audienceUses a profitable contextual advertising platform called ContentAdsUses geo-targeting along with its incremental bidding toolsPartners with MSN advertiser networks and high-traffic websitesAbility to gain exposure on popular MSN channels such as MSN Money, MSN Dating, and MSN Health & Fitness

Contextual advertising has taken on a new range and scope in recent years. Both Google and Yahoo! have unveiled their keyword-driven features and advertising packages, offering a more customized approach and increased flexibility for businesses of all sizes. Yahoo! and Google allow advertisers to limit their demographics by zipcode or region for a set fee, and this will vary by package purchased. AdCenter hopes to capture demographics automatically, perhaps eliminating the need for the advertiser to do basic target market research at all.

Online advertising and marketing have changed the way advertisers can draw from a growing web audience. Small businesses can take advantage of a number of tools and free resources that help identify keywords relevant to their industry. You can invest in context-driven advertising makes for a more profitable investment, that may also generate higher click-through rates to your website or featured products.

Read more!

I'm currently making this same argument to my father, a small business owner himself. He's a CPA, not a writer. He doesn't have time to blog. He doesn't know what to write about. And a litany of other reasons why blogging just isn't possible.

My father is rarely wrong. But in this instance, he is wrong—and if you're reading his excuses and nodding along to yourself, you're wrong too.

You're not an independent blogger trying to make some cash from your blog. You're a business owner, and your aim is SEO.

At the risk of being redundant, here are some key ways a blog will help you. (If these don't sound familiar, do yourself a favor and go back and read this page from the beginning.) A blog allows you to continuously add content. Once or twice a week is fine—Google will see that you're periodically adding content, and this is a very, very good thing. It's simple to include keywords when you're writing about those keywords. A blog post is the ultimate SEO pass: if the topic of your blog post is the keyword, it's almost effortless to include that keyword in all the right places and with the right frequency. And you don't even have to sound like a robot while you're doing it. You don't need to be a writer to manage a blog. I mean, OK, obviously you need the ability to form words and complete thoughts—but you don't need an English degree to express your thoughts on something in your industry. You have a business in your industry, which means you obviously know something about it. Share it! A blog has other perks. Among those perks: gaining recognition as a source for valuable content, providing a venue to engage with your customers (as opposed to talking at them with your website, you have the opportunity to talk with them), and building up your archive (there's that "original copy" solution).

Read more!

Small Business Blog Marketing: What Does It Entail?

Blog marketing can be quite complicated for anyone that has never even blogged before. If you are considering getting into small business blog marketing, you will want to first have a blog and see what that is like before you get into something more. Blogging requires dedication and patience. You have to update your blog on a regular basis in order to keep your readers happy. Doing so will keep them coming back for more and to see what you have new to say.

Small business blog marketing consists of blogging about your business. It definitely is a great tool that you should use to get your business out there and known by others. However, you will need to be patient because it is a long process that will require much of your attention. Just because you have a blog does not mean that someone is going to find it and read it. You are going to have to make it known. If you have a website for your business, you can link your blog to it and that will let the ones that know about your business and business website know about your blog as well.

Small business blog marketing is something that anyone can do. Having a blog and keeping it up to date with the latest information is not hard. All you need to have is a plan and you will be set to market any type of business from your blog. Whether you are selling a product or a service, it does not matter. A blog that is marketed the right way will be beneficial to any business whatever it might be.

So you are probably wondering how you are going to accomplish this small business blog marketing. When you are marketing a blog, you pretty much do it the same way that you would market a website. It is going to need keywords, and content. You can write the content yourself, or pay someone else to write it for you. That part is totally up to you. However you will want to be sure that the content is decent and something that your readers will want to read. This will keep them coming back. Make sure that the content is written from special keywords that you choose. You will also want to become familiar with SEO which is Search Engine Optimization. SEO will help you to optimize your blog to get a better ranking with the search engines.

Once you have chosen the keywords, and gotten some content published on your blog, you will be ready to get it out there some more. Link exchanges are wonderful for marketing your small business blog. You want to try and exchange links with sites that are relevant to yours, but not in direct competition. If you try to exchange links with sites in competition with yours, you are going to find that many of them will turn you down in fear of losing business to you.

Paid directories are a big part of small business blog marketing as well. You can pay some directories to list your blog URL in their directory under the specific category that it falls under. However, some of these even have specific qualifications that you must have to get in. Follow all of the application steps, and you should be ok. Just do not try to submit your blog to a directory that it does not qualify for, or fit in.

Another important thing to remember when you are into small business blog marketing is that if anyone leaves you a comment on your blog, you should acknowledge it and respond. You can also comment on other blogs that are relevant to yours, and leave a link to your blog as well. This will help bring in visitors to your blog, and you will begin to see more and more traffic.

Small business blog marketing is not rocket science, however someone that has never marketed a single thing before in their life may have problems. Just be persistent, and don’t give up.

Read more!