Category: Online Biz Fundamentals

Video: Brad talks about how to set up a proper layout for web page and shows what a good web page layout looks like and what a bad layout looks like.

Video: Brad discusses the best ways to get free and paid traffic to your website.

With the introduction of social networking websites it has enabled people to communicate with family, friends, and businesses and just about anyone that has an internet connection. It is amazing how people can now communicate with other people all over the world. Social networking is also given another opportunity for business people to make money online. Business men and women can connect with potential customers all over the world via social network websites.

Social networking sites allow you to develop relationships to people worldwide and introduce them to what your business has to offer. If you have an online business and haven’t yet used social networking for your business then now is the time to start.

Here are the top ten social networking websites to use for your business.

1. Facebook – Facebook is probably the biggest social networking website and gives many opportunities to meet new people in the niche of your business. With Facebook you can create groups for your business where you can share your offers for some great results.

2. YouTube – This is also a huge social network site allowing people to connect through video. You can build a channel of video uploads that you can share with people worldwide. YouTube allows people to subscribe to your video channel so you can build relationships through video marketing.

3. Twitter – with Twitter you can follow your friends or colleagues and they can follow you. You can share micro-updates with people who follow you and if you do it right this can be a great way to drive people to your website.

4. Squidoo – with this website you can create your own mini website called a lens and you can write about any topic you like. This is a great site for sharing information and also bringing visitors through to your own website.

5. Hubpages – is very similar to Squidoo but you create hubs in which you can write about any topic and link back to your own website.

6. MySpace – MySpace was once the biggest social networking site but is not as popular as it once was. It is still a very good site to build up contacts and promote your business.

7. LinkedIn – this site allows you to network with other business people within your industry. This is a great site for connecting with other people in the same industry or with similar business interests.

8. Classmates – this is a great social networking site that can connect you with friends that you went to school with and have lost contact with. This is a great way to rekindle friendships from the past.

9. Xanga – this is a fantastic blogging community where you can share photos, videos, blogs and more. You can network with people worldwide that share similar interests.

10. Weebly – this is another site similar to a blog where you can write about any topic and share information with other people worldwide. This is another great network site that can help you to promote your business.

These are our top ten social networking sites and there are many others out there. The most important point to remember when using any of these websites for marketing your business is that you abide by their terms of service. Your business can reach a whole new level when using social network sites for marketing so start joining some of these websites and watch your business and social life grow.

There are so many ways to get targeted online traffic to your website and it all starts with you and the product or service you have to offer. Of course it doesn’t matter what it is but whatever it is you do have to promote it to be any kind of success. So, you have your product or service now what?

Three words: Promotion, promotion, promotion. You need to promote your product or service and your website. Setting up your website was the easy part. Now you have to find ways to promote it. If you are like most people who are starting an online business you probably do not have much of a budget so to find your targeted online traffic you will have to be creative and do the right things to get ranked high on the search engines’ results pages.

This is very doable and will not cost you much at all, just a little of your time. The first thing you need to know about is keywords. They are called keywords for a reason. Keywords are the ‘key’ to getting that targeted traffic you need to your website. Keywords are the words or phrases people type into the search bar when they are looking for something online. If you have your website optimized with some of the keywords that people are using then you will rank the highest on the search engine results page and people will come to you for what they need.

Those keyword phrases? They are called long-tailed keywords and are like little gems if you can find one. They will get the most targeted traffic to your site. They are used by people who know exactly what it is they want and so they type in those exact words. If you get your hands on one of these long-tailed keywords and no one else is using it…just imagine the possibilities! Sales would go through the roof.

Other ways to get the targeted traffic you want is to write articles and submit them to article directories. Use the same keywords in your articles to connect back to your website. If you can’t write then hire someone who can. This is a very important step so do not just blow it off if you do not consider yourself a writer. If you do not have the budget to hire someone to write your articles then you will have to learn how to do it yourself.

It isn’t hard to write a 500 word article. I will tell you a little secret, if you look around at other articles out there you will be surprised and appalled at the lack of quality content of other article writers. You will soon be so confident in your writing ability that you will consider your articles much better than what is out there.

Make a video selling your product or service. Once again if you are camera shy, hire someone to be your representative in front of the camera. If you don’t know how to make a video then hire it out as well. Keep it professional and you will soon reap the benefits of increased targeted online traffic to your website and hopefully increased sales.

Do you have enough online web traffic? Probably not. This is a big deal if you really want to make some decent money online. You need people coming to your site if you want to sell stuff. It is just that simple. Getting those people to your website may not be so simple though. There are many ways to try to increase traffic to your website that you may have success with.

Write articles that are targeted to your niche and have unique content. Submit them to article directories and, if they are good, they will direct people to your website where they will hopefully buy what you are offering. Quality content can go a long way to increasing traffic to your website. Just be careful to follow the directions and rules of the article directories. If you don’t they will not publish your articles. This would be defeating the purpose of trying to get traffic to your site.

Use techniques to make people want to come back to see your website. The more someone comes to your website the more likely they are to buy something at some point. Try some giveaways like an free report on something that has to do with your product or service. If they like what they see and get from you, who knows, they might even refer their family or friends to your site. Hey, how about that? Instant online web traffic.

Make sure that you know and understand all about search engine optimization and using keywords to your advantage. Using keywords correctly is basically the backbone of getting good business to your website. Your search engine optimization will have to be tweaked every now and then so stay up to date on current changes so you can implement them immediately.

Find yourself a good keyword tool to use and search for keywords that no one else is using. It may seem like you are searching for a needle in a haystack but when you do come across one of these little gems you will be laughing all the way to the bank. Especially if it what is called a long-tailed keyword. Long-tailed keywords are phrases searchers use to find specifically what they are looking for. They really spell it out so the keywords end up being more than one or two words.

Just make sure your keywords have at least 1500 searches per month and no more than 20,000 competition in the search engine results pages. These numbers are not written in stone but they are a great jumping off point for starting your keyword research. The more you get into your keyword research then the better you will get at spotting a good one.

Start a blog of your own and post regularly. The more you post the more traffic you can get to your site. A good parameter to go by is to post once a day to your blog. If this is not possible then post at least two or three times per week. Do not post more than once a day or you may be considered a spammer and the search engines would rank you very low on the results pages and you would not get any online web traffic.

Video: Brad talks about blogging and what makes for good content on a blog.

Blogging used to be an activity reserved for writers or people with special interests or hobbies. Now, blogs have exploded and are among the most common type of site found on the web. Most active, current businesses have at least one company blog to keep their customers and prospects up to speed on the latest news, ideas, breakthrough, announcements, etc…

This short report will cover the most critical items you need to be aware of when it comes to blog marketing for your business.

Own Your Blog: There are so many different blogging platforms to choose from. Some are free and others are paid-for services. If you are a serious business looking to use a blog as a long term relationship building medium for you and your clients, make sure you “own” your blog. This means that you should host your own blog and have full control over it’s contents. Free blogs are ultimately controlled by the company who provides the blogging service. Treat your blog as you would any valuable company asset.

Content is King: This saying is almost cliche these days but it remains as true as it has ever been. If you are going to use a blog to market your business, make sure that you only publish high quality content that is representative of your company and your philosophies. Outsourcing your blog writing to someone outside of your industry would not be a smart move. If you are a small business owner, you should have a direct hand in the content creation. You may not write the content yourself but you should provide input and guide the blog. You are the ultimate expert and you need to work with your team to make your blog’s content showcase your company value.

Regular Updates: Nothing looks worse than a blog that has old content that is not even relevant anymore. If you are going to have a company blog, make sure you also have a regular blog updating schedule. It doesn’t have to be weekly but at least once a month. Make sure that the content is unique and interesting enough the pique the interest of your readers. This is your chance to build long term relationships with customers and prospects. Frequent and useful updates go a long way in this department.

Content Variety: A blog is your opportunity to be real and interact with your audience at a more personal level. Use your blog as an opportunity to share videos, photos, interviews, interesting presentations, tutorials, demos or even sample training lessons showcasing your specialty. The more variety you build into your blog, the more likely it is that people will return for more.

Search Engine Optimization: The very nature of blogs lends itself nicely with search engine optimization. Every time you add a new blog post, you are essentially adding a new page to your site that can be indexed in search engines. Each one of these pages can now be found by people searching for what you offer. Make sure that you have proper SEO settings in place on your blog so that you can capitalize on highly qualified prospects who are searching for information that you are qualified to provide. If you need help with SEO, give me a call 🙂

Many online businesses, in their haste to get up a website as soon as possible in order to start raking in the customers and the revenue, completely forget about the importance of web design when it comes to selling online.

It helps to think of your website as a physical store. Before you invited the customers in, you’d take care to make sure that everything was organized, the place was easy to navigate for as many people as possible, and that the store was clean. If your store is cluttered, hard to navigate, and dirty, many customers will turn around and walk right out upon seeing the place, without giving a second thought to the products inside.

Web design is important in the same way. When you present your site it needs to be presented in a clean, clear-cut fashion that draws the customer in and invites them to explore the website more, rather than sending them running due to an onslaught of blinking graphics and clashing colors.

The best web designs, thankfully, tend to be the more simplistic ones. Make your links obvious and your text a reasonable size with appropriate colors. Note that “appropriate colors” doesn’t necessarily mean that the website has to be in shades of white – in fact, pops of color add interest and make your website memorable – but having a yellow background with pink text is going to shock your customers in a way that you’ll likely find less than desirable.

Also fortunately, while most of us might not be web design gurus, there are a number of people who have dedicated their lives to the art of website design and maintenance. If you are a person who struggles to put italics into your HTML documents, there’s no shame in admitting that you’re not the grandfather of code. This is one place where outsourcing can be a great idea. Yes, a look at many website design sites might make you reel with the prices they quote, but there are ways to keep the costs low when it comes to outsourcing web design.

Consider purchasing a ready-made site and then buying customized graphics on top of that as opposed to getting a site made from scratch. You don’t need to reinvent the wheel. Also consider talking with students from design schools – yes, you’ll have to pay them, but they often charge much lower rates, and many students will jump at a chance to build their portfolios.

Also remember that outsourcing your web design can be claimed on your taxes for an online business. Don’t be penny wise and pound foolish – a good web design will serve you well and pay for itself in no time when it comes to the business of successful business.

Engaging in pay-per-click (PPC) advertising has its own benefits and drawbacks.

Business nowadays is doing different kinds of austerity measures when it comes to advertising their products and services. This is because of high rates of placing ads on print and on television. But there is a fast growing approach that businessmen can utilize to bring their services closer to the people and that is through Internet Marketing.

One tool that is causing Internet marketing popularity is PPC advertising. This is a technique used in search engine marketing that requires one to pay a fee every time someone clicks an ad on your website. Usually this placement is done through a bidding process. If you are a top bidder for your keywords/phrases, you are sure to be on the number one spot on all search engines. Just be sure of the effectiveness of your ad copy to get the most number of clicks you need for your business.

PPC – The Pros

You need not be a genius in computer and technology to be able to run this ad campaign.

Immediate results are seen after a few days.

No need to make a website conform to the SEO rules.

Nothing to lose even if you do not top the pages of different search engines. You can still always choose PPC advertising.

You can make use any search engine available.

You can type in any keyword you like.

PPC – The Cons

Fixed payments every month to the search engine you choose.

Pay for each click received by your website. At times, visitors are just competitors or people playing pranks on search engines. This hassle wastes money you put in to this advertising.

Inability to pay for the fees next month would mean removal of your website on the paid listings.

This advertising can only be used temporarily because it is difficult to handle in the long run.

Pay-per-click pricing can be costly for long periods of time, therefore, this should be stopped after an ad campaign.

But how exactly PPC advertising can increase traffic, leads and sales?

PRE-QUALIFIED TRAFFIC. All visitors of your website are already considered as a qualified consumer or buyer of your product. PPC advertising leads your customers to you for a lesser cost.

INSTANT EXPOSURE, IMMEDIATE PROFITS. PPC search engines enable you to get your desired results fast. They will have your website live within just a few hours which means immediate increase in sale.

CONSISTENT TOP LISTINGS. This is to get your website on top of the sponsored search results for free. You just have to choose the keywords related to your site and business and place them within your web pages. After this, you are done.

PPC advertising enables advertisers to control their advertising campaigns. Advertisers have effectively targeted their audience and set their own price per click. PPC advertising networks provide the platform to identify the desired audience by geographic setting, topic and industry. These networks have a list of websites of the publishers where the ads will be placed.

Tools are provided by the networks to check how the pay per click limit is working for a certain advertiser. If its still competitive, would it be even listed among the paid search lists or does it generate sales? Of course, if the advertiser made the highest bid, the better chances the ad will be seen in the search engine. These networks too provide protection for the advertisers against click fraud. This advertising set-up allows advertisers to set a daily budget for his ads, thus, less spending for unnecessary clicks. Advertiser will never go over his budget.

In PPC advertising, what are important are the keywords and phrases. You have to select at least 10 “very specific” keywords that would give you the best traffic in the search. Then, write the ad creatively but straightforward. Tell the truth about your product or service and do not lie. Good thing if your product or service will not disappoint those that are relying on your ad’s promise – but what if it did otherwise? Important too is the clarity of the ad. Do not use very vague languages. Include important details like the price.

Important! You should also remember to budget your bids. Do not go overbidding because you will only lose your money and do not go so low that your ads will never get the chance to show up. Check your profit against your spending. If you see no progress then most likely you have to drop your ad campaign.

More and more advertisers have been using PPC advertising and it will continue to grow faster than any online advertising techniques. From revenues of $2.6 billion in 2004 to $5.5 billion in 2009, cost per click will dramatically go up as well from $0.29 to $0.36.

PPC advertising is new in online marketing and it is going to continue in the years to come. For advertisers, this means increase revenues with fewer advertising expenses, savings, more sales, good return of investment (ROI) and effective ad campaigns in the days to come.

Finding the right web page keywords so your website will show up on the first page of Google, and other search engines, is the main goal for internet marketers. The good news is that it really is not that hard to do, with a little patience and a little practice you can optimize your web pages and benefit from free traffic too.

It is really quite simple, if you do it the right way and you get that coveted first page ranking for your website, you will get a lot of traffic, quality targeted traffic, for free.

These are called organic searches. Someone will go to their web browser and type in a search term. Let’s say someone is looking for golf balls. If they search for that term and if you’ve optimized your web pages with those keywords your website can show up very high in the search results.

This is called Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and it is a great way to get a ton of very targeted traffic which is completely free.

By ranking so high it also gives your site a lot more credibility. The average internet web surfer does not really know that much about how it all works. For that reason, many people assume that the websites listed on the top of the results pages are the best.

And in a way they are, they are the best at optimizing their web pages so they can cash in on all that organic traffic.

So, how do you benefit from using these keywords to land on the first page of the search engines? Well, the first thing you have to do is compile a list of keywords. If you really want to benefit from a top ranking you need to target the keywords you use very carefully.

It’s easy to think that you should grab all the most searched for keywords in your niche, but that very rarely works because those keywords are just too competitive.

A much better, and more efficient, strategy is to find keywords that are made up of 3 – 4 words. These long tailed keywords won’t get the huge hundreds of thousands of searches, but they will get plenty of searches a month and they won’t be so competitive that you can’t rank for them anyway.

If you choose a dozen, or more, of these long tailed keywords and each one gets say around 1,500 searches a month, you stand a very good chance of ranking for several of them, not just one.

That will provide you with plenty of traffic and since the traffic you are getting is from people who are searching for the exact keyword (and item) that you have to sell, you will get a lot of sales.

It’s just not that hard to optimize your web pages for search engines. The better you get at adding the best

web page keywords, the more organic search results you will get. That is free traffic and you will make more sales and have a much higher rate of return on your investment of time. Other than time, it’s totally free.