If you recently started an online business, you are finding out that it is different than owning a brick and mortar business. Although the basic strategies are the same:
The method of each is different. The possibilities on the Internet are limitless……….contained only by lack of passion, creativity and commitment.
Marketing & Promotions
There are countless ways of marketing and promoting an online business and a lot of them are free/affordable.
Writing Articles – Extremely effective method of building your reputation and your business. Writing articles is not hard, just stick with what you know and do not think you have to use big words to impress anyone. People are just looking for understandable articles with helpful info and useful resources.
Ezine Publishing – If you own an online business you should definitely be publishing an ezine to keep in contact with your website visitors and subscribers. Ezines themselves can be excellent income generators and they can also generate a lot of business for you.
Reading Other Quality Ezines- I have obtained unlimited knowledge and information just be subscribing to and reading other quality ezines. Good ezines contain a wealth of information and resources.
Find all kinds of ezines here: http://www.myfavoriteezines.com
Fr~e Ecourses – Compile a series of articles and turn them into a mini ecourse. Give step by step info and provide helpful resources to compliment said info. Always provide links to your website, ezine and any products that are applicable. You also want to have your email on every page so it is very easy to contact you. Assemble your course on a fr~e autoresponder and start offering it to your subs, visitors and submit it to fellow webmasters for distribution. Example: mailto:moe-mini-course@getresponse.com
AutoResponders – Autoresponders are used to mail out follow-ups to ezine subscribers, requests for more information, orders, article requests, etc. Effective follow-ups can raise your sales substantially. http://www.getresponse.com
Fr~e Ebooks – Creating an ebook is not hard. You can simply compile several articles that you or other people have written. Provide tips, resources and information. Offer your ebook to webmasters, ebook directories and ezine publishers for distribution. More info: mailto:ebooksforeveryone@getresponse.com
Building A Good Reputation- It is essential to your business that you present yourself as honest and trustworthy. You must then carry out this presentation and be a person of your word and you must put your customers first. Treat people with respect, the way you would want somebody to treat you. Your attitude and personality will show through and people will respond to you as they see you.
Getting people to your website and then to actually become a customer is no easy task. There are hundreds of thousands of websites out there, with numerous ones similar to yours. Make your site more memorable by:
1. Have valuable content
2. Start a community to keep people coming back
3. Offer something for free – free ecourse, free ebooks, free tutorials, etc.
4. Have monthly contests
5. Keep adding new content, keep your site fresh
6. Have your contact info on every page
7. Make your site easy to navigate
8. Do not use over bearing graphics/music
These are just a few ways of marketing and promoting yourself and your business. As you spend more time online, you will learn which ways are most effective for you.
I would like to talk about advertising. There are various ways of advertising your business, website, or ezine. Some are free, some not. Some are effective, some not.
Let’s take a look at some that, I think, are effective.
EZINE ADVERTISING -Buying paid ad spots in an ezine can be very effective. Some ways to find out which ezines are better for your advertising…..
Subscribe to the ezine to get an idea of the consistency, reliability and quality of the ezine.
Contact the publisher to see if they make themselves available to their subscribers. If the publisher is not available to his/her subscribers, chances are the trust/respect relationship is not there.
Read the feedback of other advertisers to see what kind of results they got.
JOINT VENTURES – Another way to effectively advertise your ezine/business is by participating in joint ventures with business associates. Examples of such Joint Ventures would be……….
Ad swaps – Contact fellow publishers to see if they would be interested in swapping ads, that is, they run your ad in their ezine and you do the same for them.
Group PopUnder/Over Windows – Joint ventures like this enable your ezine/business to be advertised on several different sites everytime they get a visitor.
SigTag Swaps – Find yourself a sigtag buddy and swap signatures for a period of time…a week, a month, whatever you agree upon. When that swap is over, arrange another one. This can bring you a lot of additional exposure.
WRITING ARTICLES – This is definitely one of the most powerful and effective methods of free advertising. Writing and submitting articles can get you tons of exposure in ezines and on websites. This also helps your search engine ranking.
The first article is indeed the hardest. Once you get started they will come much easier. Do not be afraid to give your articles a little personality and/or humor. Subscribe to some ezines and read the articles to get an idea of what people are writing. But do not try to copy somebody else’s style. You want YOUR knowledge and personality to come through in your articles.
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Terri Seymour and her husband Terry offer
a no-cost, non-MLM home business opportunity.
They strive to help you build a successful home
business. They also provide a website building
service. Take advantage of the gifts, resources &
more provided for your home and business at
http://www.seymourproducts.com FREE ecourse at:
business-building-ecourse@getresponse.com