Posts Tagged ‘ecommerce’

Blogs As Marketing Tools For Small And Medium Sized Businesses

Times are changing. In the highly competitive marketplace, small and medium sized business entities (SMBs) veer away from the traditional to more creative and interactive approaches to doing business. Opportunities now spring from new markets, new consumer segments and new marketing tools exemplified by websites specifically business blogs.

Understanding Business Blogs

A blog, short for weblog, is a website in which journal-like entries called posts are written on an ongoing basis and displayed in reverse chronological order. New posts appear at the homepage so visitors can read what is new. It is an easy, frequently updated online journal, focused around a topic, industry or personality. Authoring a blog or adding an article to a blog is called blogging while the person who posts these entries is known as a blogger. Typically, a blog is composed of hypertext, images and links to other web pages, audio, video and other files. A distinct feature of a blog is that it allows readers to write their reactions or comments to what was written in the blog post. Another wonderful thing about a blog is that a blogger can update his blog thru a special type of blogging software called a blog tool instantly from any Internet connection on any computer. He just types his entry into a simple online form and the entry is readily available on the web for worldwide readers to see.

Over the years, blogs have evolved from simple, personal online journals to effective tools for augmenting business communications. Along the way, search engines like Google and Yahoo were displaying popular media blogs produced by journalists, in most cases, appearing above other search result rankings. Propelled by this discovery, companies started writing blogs to provide relevant information about their business to potential customers to visit their sites.

What then is a business blog? It is a blog about a business. It is an organized journal about a company’s products or services. A business blog provides specific news, statistics, product releases, and other relevant information related to the company to prospective customers starting a business blog and providing these information give potential customers enough reasons to visit a company’s website. Just imagine prospective clients visiting a company’s blog periodically without the company having to spend hefty amounts of money on advertising and promotion. As they say, give readers valuable pertinent information and they will come. Moreover, customer service issues may be addressed using a blog.

A business blog is best viewed as an addition to a website. If a company has a website, a business blog is just embedded in it. For small and medium sized businesses, business blogs help put a personal touch on an otherwise bland business site. A business blog can be an excellent marketing tool to support a main business, to provide value, build healthy relationships with potential clients and thus create personal brand and image.

Blogging as a Marketing Tool

Business blogging provides a way for companies and readers to meet on common ground and discuss ideas, products and services in the hopes of building an audience that can become customers. A business blog provides a cost-effective alternative to having a website. For small and medium sized business entrepreneurs without the time and the means to set up a website, business blogging offers an inexpensive tool to herald the company’s presence on the powerful Internet.

Business blogs provide SMBs with an avenue to share their expertise and knowledge with a bigger audience. Both online and offline small and medium sized businesses can use blogs to take their products and services to a wider audience increasing web traffic and boosting sales. The fact is business blogging is fast becoming a sustainable marketing strategy for any online marketer. There are numerous ways a business can benefit from a blog.

An effective business blog can help give a human face to a business. Blogs bring a personal dimension to the web. Blogs make business sites more personal. Since blogs are updated by individuals, the “voice” of the blogger will resonate through. This will assure potential customers that there are real people behind the blog engaging them in real conversations. Blogs can be opinionated, informative, at other times infused with humor thus eliciting better response from target audience.

A business blog if used productively can improve customer service. It provides instant customer feedback through comments. It allows one’s audience to comment on a post and create a dialogue with them. A blog can act as a question and answer forum. Customers can post questions and receive instant replies. An effective business blog functions as a central knowledge base of articles, tutorials, product development status, and other relevant product or service information. This is good customer service.

A business blog keeps an archive of older posts organized by date and categorized by topic. This gives the target audience easier access to information. With business blogs, it is also easy to add new information on a regular basis. Frequent updates in the form of fresh new posts mean visitors will have all the reasons to keep coming back thus building loyal readers – best potential clients.

A business blog can increase the chances of prospective clients to visit a company’s website. For a start, visitors to a business blog can be redirected to the company’s main site through links and special offers. Use of relevant keywords and popular links to specific sales pages improve search engine ranking of both the business blog and the main website. Just like the main website, top search result rank equals traffic. With more and more people turning to the all-powerful Internet to search for products and services, it is essential for small businesses to be easily crawled by search engines. Since search engines thrive on new content, the more likely the search engines are going to visit the blog and share it with the world.

Regularly posting valuable content on a business blog builds company credibility and creates sound business reputation. A business blog can help project a company as an expert in a chosen business area. Customers feel more comfortable transacting business with a reputable company.

A business blog can be an avenue to introduce company products or services. Ideally, a blog is not about selling. A blog can be used to mention new products or services and direct visitors to the company’s main website in the process generating more sales. Interestingly, several advertising programs such as Google Adsense allow companies to monetize their business blogs and generate extra revenue.

However, a business blog is not urgent but important for small and medium sized businesses. A business blog alone is not enough to market a company product or service. But it is good investment for startup businesses to have conversations with customers and prospective clients. Business blogging is an effective way to start conversing with visitors interested in ones products or services but it is in no way to be viewed as a stand alone strategy. Yes, business blogging can do wonders. But it is not going to work on its own. A business blog is most effective when it is used in conjunction with other online communication tools such as e-mail, press release, pay per click, company websites, to name a few.

Setting up and maintaining a great business blog that visitors will find useful and relevant is just like having an effective built-in public relations staff that will spread the word about the business.

As a final thought, starting a business blog is easy but transforming it into a marketing tool that drives traffic and sales to a business takes time, dedication and consistency.

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Integrating A Website With Your Business

It has been one of my continual themes when talking with clients about their websites that their site needs to serve their business. When I work with a client, I look at their website as an extension of their business model. I take a look at their overall business and evaluate:

* How do they make their money?
* Who is their public or target audience?
* How can their public be promoted to?
* How can the web be used to help automate their business?

I’ll listen to what they want to achieve with their website and then recommend options to help that website achieve the points above: making money, automate and promote to their target audience.

Anybody looking to put up a website for business purposes needs to look at this. Too many business sites are very poorly thought out and underutilized. A good website is a lot more than good design. A good design and some content means only that a website is acting as a glorified brochure. Its better than nothing and any business today which does not at least have that really needs to get on the ball. However, beyond design, you can look at how the site will achieve the points above.

Now, a business which is all web-based is very straight-forward in this department. A web-based business is going to want to collect payments from customers via the web, so we’re going to want a secure payment system on that website. We also want that website to be well-designed so that it does not confuse people and attracts the customers’ eyes to those things which make the business money. We’re also going to want to discuss how the web can be used to promote. A business which is not web-based would want to consider what they can provide on the web to extend their business. Traditional brick-and-mortar businesses may have a storefront or may need to deal with clients in person, but what can they do on the web to extend their reach?

Promotion is paramount to success in business and on the web. A website can perform any of many promotional tasks such as:

* Collecting sales leads by asking visitors to fill out a form. Perhaps give them some free, valuable content in exchange for their information.
* Collecting email addresses for use on a mailing list
* Auto-responders sending targeted emails automatically based on customer’s indicated interests on a form
* Providing metrics on customer interest using landing pages and keyword advertising
* Running polls and surveys to find out what your potential customers want
* Running free articles which educate your customers on the subject matter of your business and get them interested.

A website is a footprint on the internet which is viewable worldwide. Depending on the nature of your business, visitors located well away from you may not be that useful in terms of potential clientele. However, there is no reason why you cannot still gather information from them to use with your local clientele. After all, if they arrived to your website, they were interested enough to come. They are a public for you regardless of their location. Perhaps you can even find a way to change your business model to include these people which are not located locally to your business.

In terms of automation, keep something in mind. A web server is simply a computer. Computers are great at doing repetitive tasks that humans either hate or would find a huge waste of time. For this reason, it is always a good idea to look over those business functions which are repetitive and see if your website can serve to make your life easier. For example:

* Sending your email newsletters could easily be done using your web server. Click a button and email your entire mailing list. Easy.
* Auto-responders can take care of automatically emailing your customers relevant information at regular intervals.
* Automatically compile sales statistics and email them to you each morning (if you do web sales)
* Export sales transactions directly into your accounting software to avoid typing them all in manually.

There are a number of ways a web server can be used to serve a very real business function and actually do some of the work for you.

A lot of this comes under the heading of programming. Design is design, however making the site actually DO something means it has to be programmed. So, if you are skilled in this area, you can do it yourself. Or perhaps you can hire it out to somebody. Before any of that, though, look over your entire business and the website you have and see how it can be utilized to make your business easier to manage or actually drive in business. Unless your website is personal in nature, then it is through the lens of business that your site needs to be evaluated.

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To Blog Or Not To Blog: The Ups And Downs Of Blogging

Whenever the subject of the phenomenon called blogging is raised, most people immediately think associated it with an online diary or weblog. The term weblog refers to key words. First is web from the World Wide Web and log, as in keeping a log. Even though it’s not that difficult to pronounce it was eventually still shortened to just “blog”.

From the time that the first ‘blogs’ made its appearance in 1994, the act of recording thoughts and experiences online spread like fire all across the globe. Today, blogging become an Internet sensation.

Actually most people are unaware that there’s much more to blogging than what we usually see online, where individuals simply write down their daily routine in a diary-like way. Blogging is now seen as a viable way to spread information and more and more professionals are getting in on the act to report on areas that interest them. It has now expanded so much that a blog can be made into practically just about anything you want it to be.

However, not everyone is enthusiastically jumping in the blogging bandwagon. There are still those remaining few who are still taking their own sweet time making the decision whether to blog or not to blog. So, what are the reasons why they are not blogging?

There are several reasons but most simply do not realize the huge the benefits of blogging. All they see is the downside like the monetary and time costs involved. Another reason is that they are intimidated with the technical side of blogging.

Also, most articles found on the net only talks about how great blogging is, without telling you why or showing you how. Or we tell you how to get the best results with your blog, but don’t tell you where to start. So here are some basic facts you might be interested in.

If have envisioned your site going from getting 10 hits a month to getting a couple of dozen visitors a day from search engines, well blogging can make that possible if you do it right. The structure of a blog, and the fact that most of them automatically generate content feeds, also make them the best food for your friendly neighborhood search engine spider.

Now, if you wish for your visitors to keep coming back to your site over and over again until they finally make a purchase, then you might want to try your hand at a blogging. An informative blog that engages your audience will cut down the sales cycle, plus it also creates a courtship period. Blogs make it possible for your visitors to subscribe to your thoughts, see if they like you and even get to know more about you.

Keep in mind that people usually buy from the people that they like. So if your visitors do not feel like they are getting a personality vibe from you, they are often less likely to buy. Vibe means buy, so keep that in mind. Furthermore, remember that blogs make it easy for you to vibe.

Another benefit you can gain from blogging is that you can create new targeted search engine pages for your site without the need to hand-code a new page, or fire up your HTML editor every time. All you need to do is simply log in to your blog admin panel, type your thoughts, proofread, and press publish. Voila! You have a blog!

Blogging can also help you with free one-way links back to your site that contains your lucrative keywords. So, even if your SEO efforts all went down the drain, or been the unsuspecting victim of an algorithm change, as long as you aren’t banned by a search engine, blogging can help bring you back into top results. Why you ask? Well, it simply because blogs have a search engine friendly architecture, and can make use of your keywords automatically, without being gratuitous. Blogs are the easiest way to get into a search engine and stay in.

Downside to blogging number 2. Blogging can be hard and expensive. This may be true enough, particularly if you’re busy, or have a medium sized to large business. In which you may have to hire one of the few consultants that works on these types of issues. Unfortunately, it means expenses.

But there is a way you can get away with that, if you’re a small business owner or a home-based business with an online element then you can get away with firing up a free blog. All you have to pay for is the very affordable custom template if you can’t install one on your own. Most blog consultants will do all the keyword research, etc for you, so that all you’ll have to do is log in and blog.

Many of the most common blog software systems are free or inexpensive, especially when weighed against the cost of only using paid methods to attract visitors.

Another reason why people do not have blogs is because they are under the impression that it will not work unless they are a competent writer. This is a fallacy. With blogging you can easily get away with just a few simple paragraphs. There is no need for you to write in professional manner or use industry jargon. By nature, blogging is done in a casual, conversational tone. Otherwise, it loses its spontaneity that is its trademark.

Moreover your blog posts do not have to be long article-type entries like either. Keep in mind that some of the articles you often find in a blog are done by an avid writer. Your audience will be thrilled with a few paragraphs every day, as long as they’re informative, consistent and understandable.

So why not take that plunge? Start blogging today and see for yourself. As for those who tried just once and immediately gave up, give it another shot. Remember that the positive out weighs the negative. Think of all the good things you’re missing. Start blogging now!

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The Biggest Internet Loophole (And How To Earn From It In Just 5 Minutes Everyday)

Every now and again the internet throws up some real loopholes. One in particular stands out, and if you’re interested in making some fast pocket money then you should check out the concept of sports arbitrage in more detail. Imagine being able to bet on both sides of a sporting event – so that no matter what the result you walk away with a guaranteed profit. Well that’s exactly what arbitrage betting is about – and thanks to the hundreds of bookmakers that continue to offer online services this arbitrage loophole is growing with more and more opportunities to claim guaranteed cash every day. The best thing is that it’s completely legal, simple to do and once you start chances are you’ll get hooked with the guaranteed and fast money that’s there for the take.

Before you get too excited lets take a moment to understand the mechanics behind arbitrage – an age old concept that has been used by banks and businesses for centuries. Arbitrage simply is an inconsistency in the market – where for example due to global differences the same product or service is charged at different prices in different locations. How is this applied to sports betting? An arbitrage opportunity is formed when different bookies have different prices for different outcomes in a particular sporting event. The bottom line is that we can place bets to cover both (all) outcomes with different bookmakers and get back more than we invested each and every time. It’s important to remember that this is a form of investment and not betting – with arbitrage you know your exact return before a ball is kicked or a stroke played. It’s also important to remember that arbitrage returns are generally low – on average yielding 5% to 10% per play – but for an investment that lasts for a couple of hours, that’s pretty good.

Why Do Arbitrage Opportunities Occur?

Arbitrage opportunities occur when there are differences of opinion on a particular sporting event between two or more bookmakers. Remember that thanks to globalization and the internet you can use an online bookmaker who is based anywhere in the world. There are many reasons why bookmakers may offer wildly different odds on the same sporting event. For a start, many bookmakers overstretch themselves when offering odds – they try and cover every possible market to get as many customers as possible.

This is great news for us because in doing so they will sometimes offer odds on events that they have little or no expert knowledge in. For example, a bookmaker in the USA may know very little about English Division 2 football games, and yet offer odds on them. In contrast, an English bookmaker will be much more “clued up” as to the likely outcomes from the same games. The result? Wildly different odds on the same games, and a feast of arbitrage opportunities and free money for us. And remember, everyday more and more online bookmakers are entering the highly lucrative online gambling market – this is great news for us because the number of juicy arbitrage opportunities will grow well into the future! Also, bookmakers are busy people – and when they are forced to offer odds in pressurized situations they can sometimes make mistakes! Again – leading to a nice stream of easy arbitrage pickings.

How To Start Earning From Sports Arbitrage

Now we have a firm understanding of how arbitrage works and what causes them we’re going to see how best to spot them, and how to organise your time for maximum efficiency.

As an arbitrage trader it’s vital that you construct a daily checklist of events that you wish to investigate. It’s very handy to buy a diary specifically for your arbitrage trades and jot down the specific events you’ll be hunting for arbitrages in. Make this a routine – for instance, perhaps on a particular Saturday you want to check the English football Premiership fixtures, the tennis fixtures and the one day cricket series between India and England. Do not randomly hunt for arbitrage opportunities without a system firmly in place.

The traditional way to approach sports arbitrage trading is to have a daily list of sporting events and work through them one by one.

If you take this systematic approach with each sporting event you have on your checklist your chances of finding an arbitrage are very good.

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Starting An Internet Business – Is It Worth It

The Home Business idea has been around for many years now, perhaps beginning with an entrepreneurial child having lemonade stands on the weekend at the front of the neighbour’s house. Obviously the neighbours house because Dad was too embarrassed to have the stall in front of his own house, and perhaps still today this embarrassment has found its way into the lives of families who we’ve all experienced, rejecting the thought of having or being shown a presentation of a business idea.

Now a Home Business idea is firstly about making some extra income to provide finance for those dreams that we can never seem to afford. A better education for our children, that well deserved holiday, or perhaps even those unheard of riches that we believe we could never have, so we never do.

It all starts with a dream or a desire, and if a business operating from home could be something you could put a few hours a day toward, then there is every chance that over time and some added knowledge and education, you could find yourself and your family in an entirely different financial situation.

Working from home with an Internet or MLM Business is a great goal, and many companies operating today, that are household names, started with that same dream and found success – so is it worth it?

A common saying that many use in Leadership circles is ‘if you fail to plan, you plan to fail’, and this is true with any business venture. The first thing we must accept and realise is, that we are starting a Business, not developing a Get Rich Quick Scheme. Any business will take time to develop and must be approached with knowledge and ingenuity, balanced with an ability to take RISKS without the FEAR of FAILURE.

For starters, building your current bank balance is a good idea, so that you have enough to invest toward your business to get it up and running, and at least 3 months extra finance in the bank to cover your current living expenses, in case things begin to get tight, as they did in the beginning for me.

Now as this is the Internet we are talking about you will need a website, which is a registered home page specifically designed to display whatever product or service it is that you have to offer. The website will be the crux of your Internet Business, and you can either build one yourself with one of the many self help services to be found online, or you can pay someone to develop a unique and attractive site – the attraction factor is not that it is pleasing to the human eye, but that it has a uniqueness and quality that the Internet Search Engines find attractive.

Professionalism is a good goal and guideline in developing your site, because if and when you are discovered online, it is then that your site and unique products or service is open to the scrutiny of the human eye. If it is a site that offers retail sales, then a secure shopping cart or similar system like Click Bank or PayPal will be useful.

Getting people to your site will be the next consideration, and this is called, yes you guessed it; marketing or advertising. Build it and they will come only applied to a fictional movie about a baseball field, but build it is a must, and advertising is the key marketing method of letting the world know you are in Business and ready to help them. There are many methods of advertising or marketing your business idea on the Internet, from Pay per Click advertising to FFA sites or Email adverts, or simply writing articles or blogs, these are all effective in there own way, and with different levels of results and success.

Once you are up and running pull out all stops and announce your business to the world. Go offline and use classified ads in local newspapers, or maybe they’re willing to give you a free plug as a new business in the local area. Run off a few thousand pamphlets and do a drop to your neighbourhood letterboxes and, you could even use the kids to run this for you.

Whatever field it is that you choose to run with, be confident about what it is that you have to offer, and use creativity, insight and business knowledge. If you lack these things then a few hours on the Internet can find almost anything you would need to fill the gap, for knowledge is cheap these days, but those who have the creativity and insight to use it, build a great business and of course make the money.

So what are you waiting for? Some of the money out there is yours and it has your name on it -My new http://business.com – you know the rest.

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How To Protect Yourself From Internet Home Business Hype And Misconceptions About MLM

The most unfortunate and damaging misconceptions about work at home business is the extra income can come very quickly.

I urge You to acquaint yourself with these three myths, and protect yourself from the Internet hype and misconceptions.

Online MLMs Can Generate A High Profitable Income In One Month

Take a look at this:

The average internet MLM pays £1 to £5 per person in an organization. To earn £1,000 – £5,000 per month, you need 1000 people in your organization.

This is possible to achieve. But it takes time.

“You Have A Ground Floor Opportunity – You Must Join Today”

When someone says: “Ground Floor Opportunity – Join Today” you have to ask yourself what are they really saying?

Are they saying “People who join after me have less chance of making money than myself or “The organisation will be useless in two to three years time.

It would be heart breaking to take a year or two to build a good residual income, only to have that income disappear over night?

And what would happen to the poor suckers who join in six or seven months time?

To be honest a good business opportunity should actually improve with time and exposure. It should be based on products (or services) – and delivering more in the product value than the pound amount people are paying for it.

Yes it IS possible to find such companies on the internet. I know a few of them.

Make A lot Of Sales and You Make loads Of Cash

MLM works best when a large number of people each help each other to make a small numbers of sales.

Let me give an example of what I mean:

In an offline business we were in, someone joins the organisation who is an awesome direct mail marketer. Soon he put together a masterly direct mail campaign to promote this opportunity. He invested a lot of money then unleashed his packages. In six weeks he had several hundred people in his downline, and was earning several thousand pounds per month.

But within three years he had dropped out of that company.

Why is this you may ask?

You see almost none of the people he brought in were able to duplicate what he was able to do. So he was unable to help them grow their businesses (and possibly had no time to help 500 newbies). And since the monthly purchase requirement was £70.00 in this particular company they soon started dropping out.

The point you really ought to understand is this:

“REMEMBER In MLM, you DO NOT make much money from making sales – You Make A Lot Of Money From Building An Organization!”

This brings us nicely to the next and final misconception:

It’s Best To Build From The Top Downwards

Many people feel that you “come in at the top”, then bring people in “under you”. They reflect this in their attitude to the job.

Be Smart and know better.

It’s IMPORTANT You Build From The Bottom

In the beginning, there is no one in your business. You just have a dream, and help from your company and up-line.

You find three people and place them in your foundation. Then you physically support them from below. Yes, they are a bit heavy at first, but you what is required – you continue to support them.

One morning you wake up and there are nine people in your structure. From the three you started with.

You’re supporting the nine people structure now, and because you do, your organisation continues to grow. Eventually, when you look up, you find that you have a solid building, based on “below support”.

Can you see this?

The bottom people you recruit and assist to take their first steps as marketers of your opportunity. When they help other people, your organization expands.

The point is that the engine that drives lasting MLM growth is people helping other people, in small numbers, and everybody making sure they do their share.

At the beginning your job is to sponsor a small number of people and support them, and encourage them to make sales… encourage them to encourage other people in the same way.

Once you build a small group of people and the helping culture takes hold, you will start to develop a rapidly growing organization… that grows rapidly and wildly with a momentum that’s impossible to stop, even if you tried to.

You will have an Internet home based business to be proud of.

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