Top 10 Reasons Why Your Business Need a Website

February 22nd, 2010 admin

A website is almost a must-have nowadays, just like mobile phones and computers are. Fast developing technology has turned having a website from a whim into a necessity.

Having your own website gives your business invaluable advantages over traditional advertising methods.

Here are at least 10 reasons why you should bring your business online:

1. Your business is open to the world 24/7, 365 days a year. Unlike your company’s office that may be open from 8-5, Monday through Friday, your company ‘s website is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. There are many different time zones that may affect your business, which is why being on the web makes it time convenient for everyone. A website is crucial to your business.

2. It’s your online brochure / catalog that can be changed at anytime. A website is easier, cheaper and quicker to update than print material. Its’ capacities are almost limitless which allow you to provide users with more comprehensive information. This will save you money on printing and distribution costs as well.

3. Reach new markets and customers with a global audience. On the Internet, you aren’t that local little business anymore. You have the potential to be seen by millions across the globe. Did you ever think your company would have the possibility of doing business around the world? Well, now you can. Without a doubt, the Internet is the most cost effective way to do business nationally and internationally.

4. Improved customer service by providing answers to questions on your website. Sales and information requests can be processed automatically and immediately, whether someone is in the office or not. Online forms can be used to allow customers to contact you or ask for further information regarding your business.

5. Present a professional image. For a small business, a well-designed web site is a great way of instilling confidence and looking bigger than you actually are. In this day in age, customers assume that you already have a website. By now, your primary competitors probably already have a presence on the Internet.

6. You can sell your products and services on your website. If you do own a brick-n-mortar business, selling in cyberspace is much cheaper and a good way to supplement your offline business. Providing secure online ordering is very affordable for even the smallest businesses.

7. Lawyers, doctors, financial consultants, entertainers, realtors and all service oriented businesses should let customers know that they have a choice. Millions of users are referring to the web and are using company’s websites to make major decisions when they need a specialized service.

8. You can gather information about your customers and potential customers by using forms and surveys. Rather than going out and getting leads, let them come to you. This is a great tool for prospecting targeted customers looking to use your products and services.

9. Provides Instant Gratification. People are busy and don’t like to wait for information. Give them what they want, when they want it.

10. Whether you are looking for new business, talent or posting job opportunities with your company, your website is a great tool for building your business.

I’d say it’s time to do some forward-thinking and bring your business online.



Try Article Marketing For Traffic

February 10th, 2010 admin

Need to get visitors to your site without a large advertising budget? Try article marketing for traffic generation. This is probably the most cost effective method of getting targeted visitors to your site. Even if you use paid advertising, article marketing should be part of every website marketing strategy.

It’s common knowledge that Google loves good content. Well-written, content-rich articles help raise your site’s ranking in the search engines. You need articles on your blog/site, and articles posted to ezines or article directories. Effective article marketing for traffic can get you on the first page of the search engines.

How does this work? When articles are submitted to the directories or ezines, a link to your site is included, usually in a resource box at the end of the article. Every article you have out there gets you an incoming link. The more links, the higher your ranking. This is a definite plus when article marketing for traffic. Even if someone else uses your article on their site, you get another inbound link.

The downside to this strategy is that this is time consuming if you’re doing the work yourself. That’s why outsourcing is extremely popular when article marketing for traffic. You can outsource the writing as well as the tedious task of submitting the articles to the directories and ezines.

You should post at least one article per day to your site, preferably original content, when article marketing for traffic. In addition, you need to submit original articles to article directories (such as Ezine Articles, Go Articles, Article Dashboard, Web Pro News, Buzzle, Article Base, and Article City) as often as possible.

With these guidelines, it’s obvious you’ll need a lot of unique content when article marketing for traffic! That’s where a good quality article spinner can be a real life saver. Instead of writing each article from scratch, you can paste your article into the spinner, change some words and phrases, and end up with a totally unique article. Then test it for uniqueness using Copyscape or Plagium.

When article marketing for traffic, the more good content you have out there, the more your traffic will increase.

Outsource Jobs To Save Time

February 7th, 2010 admin

Now that you’ve decided to create a blog, you may find it necessary to outsource jobs that you either can’t do yourself, or that you don’t like to do. And just about any type of service you can think of is available on line.

Considering all the different tasks that need to be done, most people find they need to outsource jobs that are beyond the scope of their skills. In addition, there are some things that you just will not want to do.

For example, if you’re not a technical-type person, you might need to outsource jobs such as creating the blog, installing scripts, putting up banners and posting articles.

Folks who are more technical and less verbal will outsource jobs such as content writing and/or article writing, if article marketing is going to be one of your traffic sources. They’ll also outsource jobs such as keyword research.

And for those who absolutely detest mundane tasks, they can outsource jobs such as social media work and posting to directories, both of which go a long way toward increasing traffic to your site.

There are many resources available where you can outsource jobs. To outsource web design or programming, Rentacoder and Getacoder are two options. However these and other technical skills are also available at places like Scriptlance, Get A Freelancer, Odesk and Elance. Associated Content, Scriptlance and Odesk are excellent resources for writing skills, and you can find plenty others by searching the net.

When you outsource jobs, you’ll save a lot of time. This time can be spent on other tasks, but remember that you’ll still have to manage the outsourced projects. If you want to outsource a variety of tasks and have them managed for you as well, consider trying Burn Your To Do List. From article writing to getting traffic to your site to website services to virtual assistance, they can do it all for you, and have a stellar reputation as well.

So now that you can outsource jobs and free up more of your time, how about putting up some more blogs?

How About A Freelance Writing Career?

February 6th, 2010 admin

You’ve decided to exit the workplace rat race and become a freelancer, and you know you want a freelance writing career. Great! Now it’s time to decide what kind (or kinds) of writing you’d like to do in this new freelance writing career of yours.

Visiting the many freelance writing forums and sites on line will give you an idea of how many different types of freelance writing careers are available. Some types of writing will appeal to you more than others, and your skills may lean more in one direction than another.

For example, if your writing style is more authoritative and factual, you may enjoy a freelance writing career writing business articles or technical journals. You may gravitate more toward writing newspaper articles, grantwriting for a non-profit organization or doing proposal development.

A freelance writing career as a copywriter can be very lucrative if you can master the art of persuasive writing. There is a huge demand for people who can write good ad copy. And this is a skill that can be learned. Probably the best and most prestigious resource for learning copywriting and even finding jobs in the field is AWAI – American Writers & Artists, Inc. As a matter of fact, some of the world’s top copywriters (like Michael Masterson and Robert Bly, among others) received their freelance writing career training from AWAI.

If you’re a person who likes excitement and being on the go, how about a freelance writing career as a travel writer?  How exciting is that? If you’re good enough you could even get the hiring magazine or company to pay your travel expenses as well as pay you to write.

If you’re the type of person who enjoys writing about a variety of subjects in different styles, you might enjoy a freelance writing career as a ghost writer or web content writer. Assignments such as these usually require research before you can actually begin writing, but can offer diversion.

After you jump into the world of freelance writing, you’ll begin to have a solid understanding of your strengths and weaknesses. Then you’ll be in a better position to pursue the assignments that best match your abilities and get you started on your freelance writing career.

Top 10 Traffic Ideas For Your Blog

February 5th, 2010 admin

Blogs are popular ways to create an online presence for personal and business reasons. You can build a blog for free and begin posting content right away. But, what good is that content if no one is reading it. Here are ten ideas to bring in the traffic your blog needs to survive.

Of all the successful blogs on the Internet, hundreds more have failed. Running a blog is like running a business website. Unless you are willing to put the time in and treat it seriously, you won’t be blogging long.

That is not to say that the failed bloggers weren’t serious about blogging. Mostly, new bloggers aren’t prepared for the work that goes into creating a successful blog. Just building the blog doesn’t mean that people will necessary come to you. You pursue the audience and give them a reason to see what you have to say.

1. Fresh Content – no one wants to visit a blog day after day and see the same posts. Update your blog content at least twice a week. This will be easier if you write several posts ahead of time and upload them at the appropriate times.

2. Article Marketing – the niche you’ve chosen for your blog is one that interests you. If it is interesting you will spend more time doing it. Create content not only for your blog but also to be submitted to article directories. Use the resource box to advertise your blog so people can find you.

3. Social Networking – these sites are everywhere. Join Facebook, MySpace, Squidoo, Twitter or a dozen others and make connections. You can join groups of likeminded people who are also bloggers or entrepreneurs.

4. Viral Marketing – this is where you spread the word about your blog. Talk to friends, family and even strangers. Give out business cards that have your blog address on them.

5. Use RSS Feeds – RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication.” Readers can subscribe to your feed and get email updates when new content is posted. It is an easy way for them to keep up with your blog without spending all day online.

6. Submit Blog to Search Engines – doing this allows your blog to be ranked. Google and Yahoo! are two of the most popular search engines you want to crawl your blog pages. It doesn’t guarantee top ranking, though. You’ll have to do a little more work for that.

7. Joining Forums – as a blogger you are a budding entrepreneur. Right now you are marketing yourself to find traffic and then profit. Become a member of business forums, work at home forums and others to meet new people and share ideas. You can add a link to your blog in the signature line so others can find you.

8. Visit other blogs – show your appreciation to those who visit you by also posting comments on their blogs. It is a kindness that shows others you are not just out to advertise your blog alone. Add links to your blog in your comments.

9. SEO Marketing – whatever you write, use relevant keywords. Keyword density between three and ten percent is good for getting higher page rankings in search engines. Base your keywords on a research you do to find the most popular words used in search engines for your niche.

10. Social Bookmarking – submitting posts to social bookmarking sites allows others who are members of those sites to track you back to your blog.

Using any of these ideas will start the traffic moving in your direction. It takes time but you will build the readership you want.

To start getting more traffic to your blog, sign up for FREE Instant Access to the Secret Blogger’s Cheatsheet Report.

5 Powerful Mind Success Strategies

February 2nd, 2010 admin

Building a business is a fantastic and challenging experience. You can wake up exhilarated to begin your day and go to bed feeling overwhelmed and frustrated. The key to success is to maintain a positive mindset. 

Easier said than done, right? Here are 5 keys to help you create and sustain a positive mindset so you attain the success you desire.

1. Surround yourself with successful and positive people. The influence people have over our own personal energy is amazing. Moods and attitudes are so easily spread – think about how much of a difference a simple smile from a stranger can make for your day and then magnify it 1000 times to demonstrate the power of positive and successful friends, family and associates. When you have people around you who inspire you, believe in you and want you to succeed, there’s no room for doubts and even when they creep up, they’re quickly swept away.  

2. Create a mantra or an affirmation. Repeating positive affirmations has been shown to get people through tough times and to actually help them truly believe what they’re saying.

For example, “I am building a powerful and profitable business.” Many of the most esteemed business professionals have used the same affirmation strategy to attain their success. To find the right affirmations for you, consider writing a quick list of your doubts, insecurities and complaints. These can then be quickly turned into affirmations. 

For example, if you write that you’re always feeling disorganized then your affirmation would be, “I am organized and in control.” Repeat your affirmations several times a day and feel the power of positive thinking.

3. Capture negative thoughts. We all have negative thoughts from time to time, however, negative thoughts and emotions can derail us and prevent us from achieving all we desire.  Of course catching those negative thoughts takes practice and persistence. When you find yourself thinking negative thoughts or having negative emotions, find a trigger to turn them around. The affirmations mentioned above are a great way to turn the negative into the positive. You can also find quick pick me ups like a favorite song, a walk outside in the fresh air, or some exercise to help improve your mood.

4. Set goals/intentions and then be willing to let it go. We attract what we focus on the most.  However, desperation, needing your business to be a success, is never good. Set your goals and intentions and then let them go. A certain amount of faith in yourself is necessary. Give it a try.

5. Be grateful. Gratitude is perhaps the single most powerful and positive tool for success.  When you’re grateful for all of the wonderful things and people in your life the challenges you face seem significantly less important and are more easily dealt with. 

Consider keeping a gratitude journal and make a practice of entering into it daily. That way, when you’re facing challenges a quick peek at all the amazing things in your life will make you feel as if you can tackle anything. Additionally, an attitude of gratitude helps you maintain a positive perspective and to face challenges as opportunities rather than obstacles. 

Success is within your reach and with the right attitude you can accomplish anything you set your sights on. Take action and embrace these five powerful mind success strategies and you’ll build a better business and live a happier, more satisfying life.

Considering a Freelance Career?

January 31st, 2010 admin

Whether you’ve become unemployed in this current economic downtrend, or simply had enough of the nine-to-five agony of working for someone else, a freelance career may be just what you’re looking for.

Having a freelance career has many benefits as well as drawbacks. In a freelance career, you’re your own boss. You arrange your own work schedule, find your own work, determine how much to charge for your services, and ultimately run the show. But the flipside of that is that you are totally responsible for everything and there’s no more regularly scheduled paychecks coming in.

OK, so you’ve weighed the pluses and minuses and decided to pursue a freelance career. Great! So now what do you do? Well, the first thing you need to determine is exactly what are you going to do as a freelancer? Take an inventory of your skills and your desires.

If you want to write, you could pursue a freelance career as a writer. But what kind of writing do you want to do – creative writing, article writing, technical writing? And do you have the skills to write? If not, or if you feel you could use some additional training, there are all sorts of resources available to you. Do a little research on your favorite search engine and you’ll probably find more information than you could process in a lifetime! You could even broaden your scope and add proofreading and editing to your freelance career.

For those techies out there, how about a freelance career as a programmer, graphic artist, web developer, software developer, design and multimedia specialist or networking and information systems specialist? There is need for these skills, and the need is only increasing as more people are setting up businesses on the internet.

Folks with business skills often pursue a freelance career as marketing specialists, providers of business services, accountants, bookkeepers, virtual assistants, or customer service reps. Businesses frequently keep their staffs to a minimum in order to cut expenses, and hiring freelance talent gets the job done on a pay-as-you-go basis.

After you decide on the freelance career of your choice, it’s a good idea to look around at some of the many websites and forums established just for freelancers and the businesses that hire them. Do a search on “freelance” and you’ll find plenty of places to visit! Some of the places we use most often are ODesk, elance, GetAFreelancer, Guru, and Scriptlance, but there are many many more.

It’s a good idea to look and see what kind of jobs are available, what they pay and what others with freelance careers like you are charging. It’s also important to see how other freelancers market themselves so you can put together an effective plan to launch your career.

Spend some time in the freelance career forums reading posts by other freelancers and asking questions. You’ll find that most people are eager to share their knowledge and help steer you in the right direction.

As if all this isn’t enough to keep you busy getting started, you’ll also need to consider setting up a home office and other administrative tasks. It would probably be a good idea to discuss your freelance career with an accountant to get up-front advice on setting up an appropriate business structure, taxes, and accounting software.

Having a freelance career can be a very rewarding experience provided you take the time to do all the necessary research and up-front work. 

Many Businesses Missing A Multi-Billion Dollar Market

January 30th, 2010 admin

The goal of any business is to make money. And, we’re not just talking about the short term but long term goals of increased revenue. To that end, many businesses are missing out on a multi-billion dollar market: moms. Marketing to moms is the wave of the now and the future.

Why are moms so important?

Moms are enterprising. According to BSM Media Inc., mom spending is already over the trillion dollar mark. That’s more than the budget of some third world countries.

Also according to BSM Media Inc., almost 90 percent of moms consider themselves the financial head of the home. Her husband may bring home most of the bacon but it is the moms who decide how to spend it. They shop for everything related to the household: kids clothing, appliances, electronics, outdoor furniture, accessories and home improvement items.

Any husband that shops for these things is going to consult their wives before buying them. Why? Wives do the research into these products to find the best on the market. Moms influence as much as 85 percent of the purchases for the home. That’s over 70 million women we are talking about here. It doesn’t get any bigger than that.

Think about all of the tasks that moms handle in a day. They take care of the housework, shuffle kids from school to sporting events to other activities, cook dinner and manage the finances. In order to keep everything straight, they employ a wide variety of technology. It’s not uncommon to see a mom sitting in the park watching her kids play while listening to an iPod or browsing the Internet on her iPhone.

Moms are also savvy on the Internet. The trend for many years has been moms coming out of the workplace and starting their own businesses at home to spend more time with their kids. To that end, moms have developed a network of blogs, websites and forums designed to teach moms everything from designing websites, starting Internet businesses, marketing to other moms and managing their homes all the while. Their buying power increased exponentially with their knowledge.

Traditionally the only products marketed towards women were household products and cooking items. This goes back to the archaic thought that a woman’s place was in the home. That has been a huge detriment to many companies as they are beginning to see.

Women and moms have made an imprint in the man’s world in many areas. Women are not limited to office jobs; they are CEOs and CFOs. They don’t just surf the Web, they are becoming entrepreneurs with widening influence over Internet marketing. Having moms shun your product because you are not marketing to them means they are also spreading the word to other moms across the world (via the Internet) and in their own communities.

Moms are influenced by other moms. Several generations of moms are coming together to influence the spending habits of major corporations. In the future the trend will continue. As moms become more “connected” in the world, their spending will increase. No product is off limits to mom advertising.

Moms do rule the world. Gain the support of savvy moms with your products and your business will reap the benefits.

5 Quick Tips To Get Website Traffic Fast!

January 30th, 2010 admin

Online, one of the most significant keys to success is getting website traffic.  The more visitors you have, the better your sales and profits.  Presumably you have a niche and you know your keywords, and regularly conduct keyword research to stay on top of what’s popular.  Based on those assumptions here are five quick and easy tips to get website traffic fast!

Tip #1  Make sure you’re actually tagging your keywords. 

Do you spend a lot of time optimizing your content and then neglect to tag them on your webpage?  Tags are where search engines look and if there are no tags they’ll pass right by your web pages.  Here’s a quick brief on tags.

There are a number of tag types including,

* Title tags.  Title tags are quite possibly the most important place to situate your keywords.  Here’s what they look like – <title>Primary keyword phrase here. </title>

Your title tag is where you place your primary keyword or keyword phrase.  The sentence will describe your business in less than 90 characters. 

* Header Tags.  Header tags are next in order of importance to search engines.  They’re ranked in order of importance and look like this – <h1>Primary and/or Secondary keywords here</h1>

      The “1” designates this header as the most important header on the page.

* Meta Tags. Meta tags provide the small descriptive text found underneath the title tag on the search engine results page.  Like title tags these should be kept brief, informative and up to date.

* Alt Tags.  Alt tags are used to provide a text description of a graphic.  Each graphic on your site should have a description and an alt tag. 

Tip #2 Add content to your site daily

Content is essential for traffic and a top search engine ranking.  Content is what search engine spiders look for and index – without it there’s nothing to index or rank.  Give visitors and search engines a reason to visit and index your site. Make a commitment to provide daily, optimized content and your traffic will soar.

Tip #3 Procure valuable and relevant incoming links

The more websites which link to your webpages the more valuable search engines perceive you to be, though not all links are created equal.  Search engines give more leverage to links from sites which are popular and credible and from sites which are relevant to your website topic. 

There are different types of links.

- A direct link looks like a basic website address, for example, www.yourwebsite.com

- A text link occurs when the webpage address is embedded in the text, for example, Get Website Traffic.  Readers simply click on the text and are redirected to the website page. 

- If the link is to an internal web page, for example an article published on a website, rather than the home page, it is called a “deep link.”

You can encourage linking to your website by:

* Adding content to your site. 
* Submitting to article directories. 
* Publishing press releases. 
* Blogging and participating in social networking forums, chat rooms and social networking sites. 

Tip #4 Be Social!

Now more than ever before, internet marketing is about building a community.  Whether you offer a forum on your website or you participate in social networking sites, social networking is a valuable traffic generating tactic.  Sites like Facebook and Twitter can be powerful tools for generating links and traffic to your site – create a profile and then post comments, links to your site and ideas that generate conversation. 

Get involved – many chat rooms and forums are industry specific, find those which cater to your industry, and begin participating.  Speak to and connect with a highly targeted audience. 

Tip #5 Advertise for more exposure and traffic

Advertising, when handled strategically, can be used to promote your content and products or services.  PPC advertising is often the tool of choice because you control the advertising budget on a daily basis and have the tools to test and track your advertising efforts.  Once you’ve honed your PPC ads the return on investment can be phenomenal in terms of traffic and purchases.   

For maximum results, create a traffic and SEO strategy.  Outline your plan and your goals and then take the necessary action.  Take advantage of these five traffic and search engine tips to boost your business.

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