So while you may not think you have time to spend frittering away precious hours on social media, you really don’t need to; unless you want to.
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Category Archives: Marketing
What’s Social Media Got To Do With Marketing?
Don’t be intimidated by social media. It can be a fun and rewarding way to expand your network, be a useful resource for others and over time drive traffic to your website and build your business. Here’s a quick primer for those of you who find yourselves confused.
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Web Design For Mobile Devices
Your website is an opportunity to communicate with your audience. Give them the information they need. This is not an opportunity for your designer to show off. It’s about the user.
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Website Design Matters
Well, what else would you expect us to say? But that doesn’t make it any less true; website design matters to the success of your site, the plethora of exceptions to the rule notwithstanding. When visitors land on your site their first impression will greatly effect the amount of time they spend on that page and on your site. And if you look like you slapped the site together overnight, expect that visitors will see you as a fly-by-night operation – and keep their credit card or contact information to themselves. So what goes into designing a website that invites people to stick around? Here are some simple guidelines you can use even if you are using a “website in a box” template.
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5 Low-Stress Things You Can Do Today To Boost Your Marketing
Adding more stuff to an already full task list can be stressful. But it doesn’t have to be. Here are some quick, low-stress things you can do today to boost your marketing. Really. Easy.
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Marketing: Same As It Ever Was…
Here’s my thought for the day… Marketing is really the same as it’s always been; we’ve just got much cooler tools to work with. The key is connecting with customers and now even the little guys and gals have powerful tools at their disposal. Social media and networking, blogging, email campaigns with tracking tools. These are all just new ways to do what businesses have always been trying to do; let customers know who they are and what they’ve got to offer. You can’t do it all, but if you look for creative ways to leverage new technology you will benefit the same way businesses have benefited from all such advances – like the printing press and the telephone.
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Are You A Moving Target?
I just visited two websites – completely different businesses, different web developers, different industries – with the exact same problem; horrible navigation. Now I don’t normally like to start on such a negative note, but these were especially egregious examples of really bad user experience. The navigation links on both of these websites were quite literally moving! On the first, I needed to attempt several times before successfully clicking the “contact us” link. On the next, the entire navigation menu was scrolling horizontally.If you want people to connect to you make it easy! A clean, simple design that allows users to quickly and easily find out how to contact you is always a must. Save the “cool” effects for non-content; aesthetics, backgrounds, etc.
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Marketing Your Website
One of the biggest questions clients ask is “How will people find me once my website is up and running?” Our clients are mainly small businesses. The first thing I encourage them to do is to think about ways that they can get the word out about their online venture that they may be more familiar with. Old School Before you do anything else, make sure your URL is everywhere your business name appears; business cards, letterhead, advertisements, email signature, etc. Networking – get out there and meet people and hand them your business card and encourage them to visit your website. Many networking events are free or low-cost. Advertising – this can be done via traditional print media and is often something people forget to do when they start building their online business. This, of course, requires you develop an advertising budget and may require you to get creative to…
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How Do I Get My Business Online?
The first step to successful online marketing is to identify your goal. If you are a merchant, you will obviously want to sell your products online on an eCommerce site. For service providers, it might be to build your “brand”; establishing who you are and your expertise online. Once you know what kind of website you need, you will need to register your domain (the name of your site) and set up a hosting account. If you will be selling online you will need to work with a provider that will support the kinds of services you need for your business, like shopping carts and database management for example. Naturally, you will need to develop content – the information on your website. The information on your site will need to be relevant for your intended audience. eCommerce websites will need to have merchandise organized into categories and subcategories. Brochure site…
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Green Eggs And Spam
Email is a great way to stay in touch with clients and prospects. It’s quick, relatively easy and extremely cost effective. Here are my Top Three Tips for using emails to your greatest advantage:
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