Marketing
Is Your Website A Strong Marketing Tool?
By Agnes Ikotun
In the last year, I’ve had situations where service-based business owners have asked me to review their existing websites. Because they are disappointed that they weren’t getting the kind of results, that they had imagined they would get when they had their websites designed.
My first question to them is, during the design process with their web designers, were their marketing plan goals aligned with the design blueprint? And more often than not, I’m told that they really just wanted a website that was beautiful and one that advertised what they could do.
Here are some important tips to focus on during and throughout the design and implementation process:
How to Create a Facebook Fan Page
By Agnes Ikotun
As of 12/28/2010, here’s how to create a Facebook Fan Page.
Step 1: login to your Facebook account.
Step 2: Click on the Home tab, find it in line with Profile and Account.
Step 3: On the left hand side column, click on the more link to extent it.
Step 4: Click on Ads and Pages link
I Tweet, I Post, Why Blog?
By Agnes Ikotun
I read this very informative blog post about why it’s important to blog by Donna Toothaker, one of my good business friends and I have to share it with my readers.
Read Post:
I’m often asked by my Virtual Assistant clients, “I submit articles, I tweet on Twitter, and post on Facebook, I publish an ezine – do I still really need to blog?”
Yes, you do! And here’s why:
Connect on a personal level: A blog is a way to start a conversation about a particular subject – in this case related to your business and the issues surrounding it. By inviting your readers to join the dialogue, you create an opportunity to engage your readers – clients and potential clients — on a more personal level than in a website or even an ezine. Your posts reflect your thoughts and ideas on certain matters, making deeper connections with your readers’ ideals, values and needs. Readers can comment and commiserate on issues, offering you the chance to offer solutions. This is relationship building – taking you a step further toward creating clients for life.
The consistency of your topics is key to building and keeping an audience. Readers turn to blogs for specific information, news, ideas and conversation about a topic that is important to them. By keeping your posts consistent, you become an expert and the source of what they are searching for.
Search Engine Ranking: Fresh content is the steam that fuels search engines. And as we all know, steam rises! Again, the key is consistency in your posts. When your posts contain related keywords and phrases time and time again, search engines, like Google, put you higher in the rankings. Don’t let your blog sit idle. Post regularly and send your search engine ranking skyward!
Benefits of Article Submissions for SEO & More
By Agnes Ikotun
I was asked recently about the benefits of article submissions, so I’d also like to share my thought on this valuable marketing activity with you, my readers.
Firstly, writing articles is one of the few ways to show that you are an expert in your field or market. So providing valuable information to your audience on a particular subject area or topic helps in developing a connection with potential clients or customers by giving them a quick snapshot of what you do and how they can gain from it.
Submitting your articles is a gift that continues to give for a long time, and here are some of the reasons:
Content Really Is King!
By Agnes Ikotun
You have a beautiful website with all the bells and whistles. You have promoted your business to the best of your ability. You’ve spent both time and money but can’t see any return or you are not getting the kind of results you want: the people connecting with you are not your ideal clients or customers.
Have you really looked at your content? Have you really really read through your website with a fresh pair of eyes? It would be worth your while to ask for a second opinion.
Your website might just be what is holding you hostage.
Building A Community Around Your Business
By Agnes Ikotun
There are many strategies that can be used to grow your business but one strategy that not only supports business growth but also helps a business owner connect and help more people is building a community around your products and or services.
There are many reasons why small business owners should not only consider this but actually have it as one of their marketing strategies.
Business Showcasing
By Agnes Ikotun
My favorite thing to do on the Internet is visit websites! I’m always excited about seeing other websites and I get inspired in the midst of all this as well.
In these latter parts of the year, a lot of business owners are working on revamping their websites and I do know that a lot of the websites that I use for various reasons are rolling out their new sites instead of waiting till the start of the upcoming year.
Are you thinking about rolling out a new dynamic website for 2011? Here are some questions on an important aspect of having a business website:
Why Hire A Web Designer
By Agnes Ikotun
A lot of business owners start their businesses with an extremely small budget so it makes sense do everything themselves including putting up their websites. With the many variety of site builder tools provided by web hosting companies and FREE non self hosted services like Blogger, WordPress.com and etc, you can get a good looking site up in less than a day.
So you say to yourself why would you need the services of a trained web designer, if you can get it done on your own.
Sooner or later, it gets to the point where you need your business website to reflect your commitment to your business.
Do not think that the well informed potential client would have a positive impression when they view your website as “homemade”.
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RSS
Blog Commenting Etiquette
By Agnes Ikotun
I’ve wanted to write about blog commenting for a while, as its become one of my pet peeves. Blog commenting is a great SEO activity for developing relationships with other businesses and potential clients. But it seems like many people aren’t working it in the right manner.
It’s quite sad when a business owner pays their hard earned money to an SEO company for link building campaigns. And what these so called SEO experts do is make ridiculous and generic comments at the most inappropriate places; which by the way never get approved or published. I’ve reached the point where I close comments on new posts after a short while because I get the silliest comments.
Here are examples of comments I’ve gotten in the last 2 days:
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Published by Agnes Ikotun in Blog Commenting, Effective SEO, Quality Link Building, Search Engine Optimization, SEO Activities