Getting noticed on the Internet – Digital Marketing for Small Business

The Internet has grown from a small network of academics needing a way to trade research into a world-spanning, ubiquitous marketplace and repository for nearly every possible kind of information and knowledge. How does a small business avoid being washed away in the constant tide of buying, selling and marketers hawking every conceivable item (and some difficult to conceive…)?

The Internet provides advantages for both customer and proprietor in that one can search for exactly what is desired, without the bother of endless phone calls, driving to malls, or poring over mail-order catalogs. A quick keyword or 3, and hundreds of results vie for attention on the screen. Making sure your company is one of those results near the top is a combination of factors: specificity in product offerings, Search Engine Optimization of web content and linking to and from related topics and sites.

The only way to get noticed on the Internet is to have a listing or presence, whether a dedicated website, ads on relevant sites, or by word-of-mouth. Oftentimes ads on online journals, informative sites, or e-zines (online magazines) are cheaper than space in a print publication, as well as being available to a wider audience than a dedicated website may be. Rates are often available for daily, weekly, or monthly terms, increasing flexibility and allowing a tight budget more leeway. Word-of-mouth advertising can be very cheap, but the returns may be difficult to quantify. Sponsoring web shows such as podcasts or webcasts can be a great and cheap way to gain word-of-mouth exposure. Many times, a podcaster will be so thrilled to gain sponsorship that rates can be negotiated for very little, but make sure to approach a podcaster that has a show related somehow to your business. Don’t overlook resources like Google’s Adwords either, as they can be slightly pricier than similar options like banner ads, but they are shown to be far more effective than pop-ups, banners, or pay-per-click ads due to their specific targeting.

When a potential customer decides to look up a product that you sell, is he or she going to find your site or listing? Being specific in the terms used on your site or listing is key, as keywords are what drive the search engines like Google and Yahoo. If your company sells shoes, it’s not enough to put the word “shoes” on your site–it has to be anticipatory to the searches that potential customers are doing. Most customers have an idea of what they are looking for when doing a search, so instead of “shoes,” a customer will search for “imported Italian leather shoes.” Specific focusing of terminology and product listings are involved in Search Engine Optimization (SEO), as SEO is driven by specific keywords and their repetition or location on a page. If the term “Italian Leather Shoes” is used 15 times on a website, it will pop up higher on the rating listings than one with the same words, but only as a page heading or title. It would be easy to go overboard on this if it were the only criteria, but it is only one of many different methods search engines use to list websites by relevance. Our article on Search Engine Optimization, located here, is a great reference to optimizing your site for maximum Search Engine Performance.

With a clear idea of where you want to go with Internet marketing, it can be a valuable tool to expand your business into the digital realm, but be careful not to go overboard, as all marketing eventually crosses into the zone of limited return. Customers are looking for what they want–it’s up to you to make sure they run into you, and the only way they will is for you to make sure your business is at the places they are going to go.

Internet Video – The New Face of Advertising

With broadband internet access being somewhat ubiquitous these days, the way we use the internet is changing. Since it’s inception people have used the internet to seek out information. Today with technologies like blogging and video sharing beginning to mature, more and more people are more receptive to turning to the internet for entertainment, and not just information. With this change, and the advancing sophistication of ad-serving technology, online video advertising has seen huge growth in the past three years.

In 2004 online video advertising was a $121 million market. It is predicted that by the end of this year that the market for video ads online will have grown to $647 million/year. Companies like Google are showing their confidence in the market with their recent purchase of YouTube. The $1.7 billion deal to some was a bad idea, but Google is a company that has always looked towards the future, and they are banking on the idea that a portion of the $74 billion television advertising market will soon migrate to online ads. The three hundred percent growth in video advertising online show that Google has the right idea. Google already owns a good portion of online text advertising, it only makes sense for them to expand into video as the market for such advertising expands.

Since the industrial age began companies have sought ways to advertise their products. Television advertising, although expensive, gave them the ability to target certain markets and age groups. Video advertising online allows for even more targeted ads, and at a savings over traditional style ads.

In the past advertising via video meant huge costs. It would start with an advertising agency that came up with a concept. Then a production company made the ad, and finally to get your ad on prime time television an outlay of upwards of a few million dollars may have been required.

Advertising with online video costs less, and can be targeted to whatever demographic you want. A simple flash animation posted on the front of the latest breaking story on one of the larger news sites can generate more interest than the more expensive television ad ever could. Of course professionally produced ads can still be found online, and even ads that were originally made for television; but online video gives companies more flexibility to both budget and audience.

It is our interest in online video that is changing the way people communicate, the way we seek out information, and the way we are entertained. That huge growth in online viewing is changing the way companies advertise as well. Personally I find a small advertisement posted to the beginning of a news story, or shown between rounds of word womp on gaming sites like pogo, lesss intrusive and less annoying than traditional television ads. Since its humble beginnings the internet has been changing our world. Online video is just the next step, and where business sees opportunity to reach people they always tend to follow.

Internet Affiliate Program

With over 1.3 billion Internet users there is little left to doubt about the increasing popularity of the new medium. The dominance of Internet can further be observed by its ubiquitous influence. Be it business, education, health, entertainment or any other sector, the power of the web cannot be denied at any cost.

Amongst the many web based businesses, there is one that catches the offline as well as online business headlines. Affiliate marketing is one of the fastest growing business sectors in the world today. Website owners and publishers who had given up and abandoned their projects are once again rising with renewed hopes of making money online.

Affiliate marketers help the service providers or manufacturers in various marketing and promotion tasks. Affiliates do online brand promotions, online advertising, lead generation and other marketing tasks for the merchants or associates. Internet affiliate programs are the task lists that merchants or service providers make available for the affiliates. By joining a merchants program a website owner or affiliate is liable to do marketing of products are services as provided by the merchant in lieu of regular payments which are received by the affiliate.

Key components of an Internet Affiliate Program: To make things easy to understand, an affiliate program is simply an invitation by a merchant to join his business and make available his (the affiliate’s) website. Such an invitation is visible on the merchants own commercial website. The invitation or offer reveals the terms and conditions observing which the affiliates can join the merchants. Some important elements of an affiliate program are:

• Commissions: It is the first thing that gets displayed before an affiliate makes up his mind as whether to join the program or not. The commissions vary and are generally about 0.01 per cent to 0.05 per cent for every hit. Commission rates determine the revenue sharing that takes place between the merchants and affiliates. The more the figures the better paid the affiliates are.

• Niche market: Merchants providing affiliate programs deal in some specific industry goods or services. Some popular affiliate programs are provided by retailers, financial institutions, online gaming enterprises, tour operators, etc. The merchants may further provide for an affiliate program for specific products only, like mobile phones, personal computers, laptops and notebooks, electronic consumer items, etc.

• Tracking: In an affiliate program you might also find the tracking systems and tools that are employed by the merchant to keep record of the activities and actions that happen due to affiliate’s participation. The tracking helps merchants and affiliates to find the compensation amount that the merchant has to pay to the affiliate.

• Referrals: Other than the usual commissions the program may further provide for referrals. In this case an affiliate by referring the program to other publishers can earn extra money. Whenever a referred publisher joins the merchant, the affiliate who has referred gets paid. There can also a multi-tier program in which case the references that get generated because of an affiliate will make available a compensation amount to him.

• Registration fee and account maintenance: Most affiliate programs offer free registration for the affiliates. There may be some annual fee asked for the maintenance of accounts, especially those provided by affiliate networks.

• Payment options: Affiliate programs also declare the mode of payment by the merchant. It is Paypal account, online banking transfer or paychecks. The frequency of the payment like twice monthly or once in a month is also covered in the program.

• Promotion material: Some programs make available various promotional materials that you can place on your website. Do check for them before joining for the program.

In order to make the best use of the affiliate program you must know about your own requirements and also understand what is covered in the affiliate program.

Internet Marketing Promotion Advertising – Imagination

Given my present understanding of my ubiquitous lack of understanding of the world in general, I can’t help but smile just a bit when I think about my beliefs when I was around 15 years old. I was in 10th grade at the time and good god did I ever have it all figured out. On a pretty consistent basis I would use words like “ignorance, short sighted and unaware” when talking to my mother; and I guess probably most other people that had the misfortune of chatting with me. As you can probably guess, it turned out that I really didn’t know everything. Well, here I am a full-grown adult and, fortunately, I am much, much wiser; I currently know that I don’t know anything. And, if I ever start to forget that, I am thankfully reminded on a consistent basis how little I really know.

This just happened about 10 minutes ago, in fact. I thought that I had the internet marketing and advertising thing pegged. I was thinking about all those annoying pop ups and all the other advertising that frustrates me; on the up side this irritating new field of advertising has given rise to an unprecedented number of new jobs, for the people that are able to create all the software that shields the rest of us from the internet advertising. So, anyways I had my mind made up that people could be divided up into two camps—the good and the bad. But, much like the Haitian Revolution, things have much more complexity than just black and white (haha, I just threw that in there to pretend like I did know something…I had to read a book for school).

Let’s get back to the topic at hand. I sort of saw the internet marketers as a group that found their financial success wherever it happened to be and without consideration as to what was necessary in order to achieve it. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think they’re killing puppies or anything. But, I do think that there’s a certain pride that can come from contributing something positive to the greater community and those that choose to directly and consciously work in means that are in direct conflict with that aren’t on the good side.

But, I just was informed about alittle thing that’s throwing a wrench in my good vs. evil dissection of the world. It’s the business that does networking for the internet advertisers and marketers. Now, it seems like the companies that are behind all the banner ads and the like are on the short end of the stick from these internet advertisers for the internet advertisers, the victim of uncouth internet practices. This changes everything for me. I’m not simply talking about internet advertising, but the mulit-layered complexities that is a spider web of friends and foes and who is crossing who and back stabbing who, while helping who else. Hmm, I have a lot to think about, but for sure I understand that I definitely don’t know anything.

Internet Marketing and Promotion 101

Internet marketing is perhaps the most important aspect of business website management. So what is internet marketing, and how do you get started?

The design of a professional website interface, programming code and informative content to assist potential and existing customers of your business is an important step in moving your business online, but it’s a small part of the process of online marketing. Your website is an important marketing and sales tool, and is often the place that your internet marketing activities are designed to direct people.

Internet marketing is the ongoing process of promoting your business, and includes pre-defined objectives such as increasing brand awareness, advertising, promotion and customer relationship management. Common methods of internet marketing to promote goods and services include email marketing, affiliate marketing, search engine marketing, blog and article marketing, interactive advertising, membership and loyalty program marketing, and reseller marketing.

Internet marketing requires the detailed analysis of your business’ long term needs and objectives, and the creation of a marketing plan to accomplish them. Your website’s design should support and complement these objectives, and ensure that your ultimate sales objectives are facilitated.

Here are some ideas to get you started:

1. Create an online marketing plan

2. Start a newsletter

3. Create an affiliate program

4. Optimise your website for search engines

5. Start an online blog

6. Write articles

7. Provide useful information and tools on your website

8. Provide “link bait”

9. Provide community-targeted services and facilities on your website, and allow people to register on your website to join the community

10. Start a loyalty program

11. Create a reseller program

12. Start a pay-per-click program

13. Advertise your online services offline

14. Create a viral marketing campaign

15. Use online gift and discount vouchers to drive customers to your website

16. Measure your results and reinvest in successful undertakings

Internet marketing should never be seen only as a subset of your business’ marketing mix. Your business website is such an important part of your business that it should be entirely indivisible from it. As such, all marketing undertaken to accomplish your business promotional objectives should encompass a route through your website in addition to any other first contact points to your business.

Likewise, any services you provide offline should be available online either supporting your core goods and services, or better still, as your core means of accessing your goods and services. By leveraging the ease-of-use, accessibility and ubiquitousness of the internet medium, you will soon be on the fast track to a well-oiled online marketing machine.