Small Business Online Marketing Plan for 2009 -
part one
Small business online marketing plan for 2009 is all about helping you, the small to mid-size business owner or marketing person, open up a new online marketing system that will radically boost your targeted traffic. The goal is to get your business making money online like it never has before.
Dear Bob: It was a pleasure working with you! Thanks for all your great ideas and great lines. Roshini Rajkumar |
So I had to come up with an economic stimulus plan of my own. And that’s what this article is all about. Stimulating economic opportunities for small business owners like you and I.
You don't need my help with off-line marketing...
Most of you already know the best offline marketing opportunities for your business. But very few business owners I meet know more than a few online things they can do to build their business. So that’s where most of the growth opportunities lie for most small businesses.
That said, there’s an old saying I’m rather fond of:
You don’t win the next war by preparing for the last one.
That’s why the French had their butts handed to them in a week by the Germans in WWII. The French generals were busy preparing defenses for a remake of WWI while the German generals were developing new strategies, tactics and weapons for the next war.
Hence, the French developed the Maginot Line and the Germans developed the Blitzkrieg. And we all know how that worked out.
So, figuratively speaking, who are the “Germans” of the ‘Net?
The Internet Marketers.
They do all their business on the ‘Net. They make all their money on the ‘Net. And they are the people who are developing the cutting edge Internet “weapon systems.”
So that’s who I study. I buy their information, I watch what they do (not necessarily what they say), and I test it out for myself to separate the wheat from the chaff.
Back when there were only a few “gurus,” they could get away with just re-packaging old information and selling it. That doesn’t work anymore. Now there are so many people claiming to be Internet “gurus” that the only way anyone can get any attention is by giving away free information to prove they know what they were doing.
So my project has been collecting both “for sale” and free information from Internet Marketers, evaluating it, testing it, and putting it all together into an Internet marketing package for my own use and for my clients.
UPDATE - 6-9-2010 - If you're looking for tools to help you simplify or automate your online marketing, I recommend you read these reviews of Website Marketing tools.
Careful who does your search engine optimization...
I have a very good friend who is a master at search engine optimization. I partner with him on all his projects to write the SEO copy for his clients and he does the SEO research for my clients while I write their copy.
His biggest problem is that he’s swamped. And he’s been looking for someone or another firm to help him with all the work. As many of you probably have, he gets approached regularly with offers to, "SEO your website and get you top listings in Google!"
And the first thing he does is check their website. If they aren’t first page in Google for their keywords, how could he expect them to accomplish that for his clients?
Needless to say, he’s still working alone.
What I’m trying to say is that there are very few people who actually know what the heck they’re doing when it comes to website promotion.
So where's my economic stimulus package?
So what’s the point of all this? Where’s the blasted “economic stimulus package” I promised? Right here. The following is the process I’m using to promote my business and it’s the same process I’m using to promote my clients.
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While I prefer to see a client’s website receive organic search engine optimization first, it’s not a mandatory first step for these methods to work. What is mandatory is that you know the right keywords to promote your website for.
Because if you promote your business for the wrong keywords, then you may get tons of traffic, but since they came for the wrong reason, they won’t buy from you or contact you.
Promoting the wrong keywords is like advertising that you’re the Walmart of jewelry and when people get to your store, they realize you’re Tiffany & Co. (Or vice-versa).
Or advertising that you’re a coffee house because you know that’s what’s really popular and it will get lots of people to come. Then when people get there, they find out you only sell tea.
Don’t make this mistake. It will make all of this a total failure. Here’s an article on how to find the right keywords.
So here’s what I want you to do once you’ve established the correct keywords to promote your business on the ‘Net:
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Promote your website through Online Directories that are SEO friendly, free, non-redirect, non-reciprocal, general and human edited, which are the qualifications of a directory that you want to get into for maximum benefit.
The following link will take you to an 800+ online directories list that fit this exact description. If you post your website at five directories every day, within a few months you will have hundreds of high quality, one-way, inbound links to your website.
- Promote your website with articles. Sign up with my favorite article posting websites for business promotion and begin creating articles, one per week, to post to one of these article sites.
Post a different article to each site and rotate each week from site to site. Make certain that each article has one of your keyword phrases in the title of the article, in the first paragraph and the last paragraph. These sites love bulleted articles and “how to” articles.
Open the article with an introductory paragraph, give the bullet points with a paragraph for each, and close with a conclusion paragraph. You’ll be allowed to give a link back to your website in the “resource box” at the end of your article. And don’t make a sales pitch in the article. It will be rejected. Make it informational.
Make certain that the link back to your website either has your keywords in it, or has your keywords as Link Anchor Text. In other words, if your keyword phrase is “low cost mortgage,” either your URL should be:
a. http://www.majormortgage.com/low-cost-mortgage.html
b. or your anchor text should be: low cost mortgage.
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Start a blog. Even if you have to pay someone else to write your blog posts. If you don’t have a blog and don’t want to figure out how to create one, you can get a business blog created for you for $250 at LyricalBiz.
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I also highly recommend you make sure your blog is in WordPress. There are hundreds of “plugins” you can get for free for your blog that will make it do literally everything including sing and dance. Those “plugins” simply aren’t available with any other blog type.
a. Make a list of other blogs that are related to your blog. They can even be competitors. Begin commenting on their blog. This will create backlinks to your blog and also get your business name out there.
b. Make sure that any comments you make are of value and add to the conversation. If your comment doesn’t contribute valuable information or suggestions to the post, no one will see you as an expert so they will ignore your comment. And the blog owner will probably delete your comment.
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Start a bookmarking campaign. Sign up for at least three or four bookmarking services through this bookmarking site list and bookmark your website. Then bookmark any articles you post on article sites and any blog posts you have on your blog. Also bookmark any press releases you create.
Two caveats: -
a. Don’t just bookmark your own stuff. Otherwise, it will be obvious what you are doing and no one will look at your bookmarks. Add blog posts and articles you happen to find on the ‘Net that are of interest to you or to your customers.
b. Don’t be the only person bookmarking your stuff. Ask friends, family, employees and clients to bookmark your content. The more people bookmarking your posts, articles and such, the more popular it becomes and the more likely it might go viral.
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Put out press releases. I recently discovered a free press release service. Once a month, put out a press release that is a story that ties in with something happening in the news. Read this article on How To Write A Successful Online Press Release and follow its advice whenever you write one.
a. Make certain you have links in the press release leading to more information and also to your website. And use images and if possible, videos in the press release. Remember, this is an online press release and can use all kinds of media. (Google loves media!)
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One last trick: Build three-way-links. Reciprocal links rarely give you any Google juice at all. Google sees the ‘Net as a popularity contest. That’s why we work so hard to build one-way, incoming links. And preferably from more popular sites than our own.
(Higher Page Rank sites.)
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Here’s how it works.
If you know of two other websites in related fields owned by friends or business associates, rather than giving each other reciprocal links which create no value, give a link to one of them, have them give a link to the other person’s site, and have that third person link back to you. Just like a triangle.
Then each of you has a one-way, incoming link from a related industry, something Google sees as highly valuable. And the more of these “three-way” links you can create, the better. If you’re in a networking group, I bet you can find at least two other businesses in your group to create your first three-way.
Let's say you're a chiropractor and there's an accupuncturist and a massage therapist in your BNI group. You link to the accupuncturist with a link that is not the name of their business but rather the primary keyword phrase for the page you're linking to.
Next, the accupuncturist creates a link to the massage therapist, again, using link anchor text that is the primary keyword phrase for the page they are linking to. Lastly, the massage therapist links to the chiropractor in the same manner.
This is just a sampling of the linking strategies I use for my clients but it’s more than enough to get you hundreds of valuable, incoming links.
If you follow these steps, you’ll be climbing in the Google ranks in no time! Not to mention all the increased traffic to your website from all the ihncomming links.
Check out our complete list of business marketing articles and online marketing articles!
If you'd like to enjoy the benefits of all my experience and knowledge and “all my tricks” applied to marketing your business website, don't hesitate to call me at 612-226-7667 or send me an email at bob@wordsmithbob.com .
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Related Articles:
Using Blogs, Articles and Newsletters to Dominate Your Niche in the Web
How To Find The Right Keywords
Entrepreneur Magazine had great recession advice in 2002…
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