Title

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Marketing your Small Business on the Internet
Lilly Buchwitz Farmington, NMApril 14, 2004
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Overview
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Part I
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Your Web site

• Your Web site is your most important marketing
  communications tool
• Your Web site is the face of your business
• Your Web site is on the World Wide Web your
  customers are more likely to come from Montreal,
  London, Paris, or Tokyo as they are from New
  Mexico

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Before you promote your site

• know your area of service, and make it clear on
  your site
• know who your target audiences are
• think about what they might expect when they
  arrive on your site
• then design your site with your audience in mind
• keep it simple!
• The number one reason why anyone goes to any Web
  site is to find information

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You never get asecond chance tomake a first
impression
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Whos the audience?
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Whats the product?
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Whats the product?
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Part II
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What you need to know about search engines

• A search engine is not the same thing as a
  directory.
• There are only three search engines that matter
  today.
• Understanding how search engines work and how
  people use them will help you get found on
  them.
• You must carefully prepare your Web site before
  you submit it to the search engines.
• Submitting your pages to the search engines takes
  less than 10 minutes.
• The only person who can prepare your site and
  submit it to search engines effectively is
  you.

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search engine marketingis a lot like
paintingyour home
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Search engines that matter
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Theres only one directory that matters
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Specialty directories

• Search for directory and search engine on
  Yahoo! for a list
• When you find a directory specific to your
  business, check it out to make sure its
  appropriate
• Then (and only then) submit your site
• You may have to pay for a listing and its
  probably worth it

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How search engines work
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How directories work
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How people search

• they start with broad, general terms like
  travel or wine
• narrow it down by adding more specific words
  (travel Spain or wine Merlot)
• they will not search for your company by name
• they will never search for the wordswelcome to

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Preparing your site to get found(this is the
hard part)
Choose 10 words that describe your business,
service, or products. Take your time. Think like
a searcher. Lets look at an example
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beer wine Toronto make wine brew on premises make
beer grapes
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Using your keywordshtml title

• The html title of the page is what you see at the
  top of your browser when you are on that page.
• Its what displays as the link for your listing
  on a search engine.
• Keep it under 75 characters.
• Make each title relevant to the page its on.
• Spend the most time writing the title for your
  home page.
• Write a title for the starting page of each major
  section of your site.
• Best place to make beer and make wine in
  Toronto Fermentations

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Using your keywordsmeta description

• The meta description tag describes in a little
  more detail whats on your page
• Its what displays below the title in your search
  engine listing
• Keep it under 150 characters to be sure it
  doesnt get cut off
• Make each description relevant to the page its
  on
• Try to entice potential visitors with clever
  copy, so theyll click
• more

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Using your keywordsmeta description

• Its not really about ranking, its about
  describing your page to potential visitors
• Not all search engines use it, but if they do,
  its what shows up on the search results page
  below the title of the page
• Heres how it works
• s Toronto's favourite place to make beer and
  wine"

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Using your keywordsmeta keywords

• The meta keywords tag can be the same for all the
  pages on your site
• Not all search engines use this tag when ranking
  sites but it cant hurt to include it
• Use a list of words and phrases with no commas in
  between (search engine spiders are programmed to
  read only a certain number of characters in the
  keyword tag if they read it at all commas just
  take up space)

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Using your keywordsmeta keywords

• Heres how it works
• brew on premises brew your own beer make your own
  wine make wine from grapes

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Using your keywordsALT tags

• every image on your Web site should have a
  carefully written ALT tag
• the ALT text is what visitors see if they move
  their mouse over an image

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Using your keywordsfile names

• dont use abbrv.

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Using your keywordson your home page!

• Work your keywords into the copy of your home
  page (and on other pages, if you can) as many
  times as you can without making it sound
  ridiculous.
• This may seem obvious but it aint necessarily
  so.
• Focusing on your keywords when writing the copy
  for your pages also helps reduce jargon.
• an example

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What NOT to do

• Dont load your meta tags with irrelevant
  keywords just because they get searched for a lot
  (like sex).
• Dont repeat your keywords several times in a
  row.
• Dont hide text on your pages by making it the
  same colour as the background.
• Dont use a string of keywords for the title of
  your page.
• Dont submit exact copies of pages with different
  file names.
• Dont use re-directs or other technology that
  will confuse the search engines spider

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Submitting your site(this is the easy part)

• Bookmark the submission pages of the three search
  engines that matter or bookmark my page
• Highlight the URL of your page, press CTRL/C,
  then go to each submission page and paste in your
  URL. You can submit one page to all the search
  engines in less than five minutes.
• If your site is small enough, submit all your
  pages this way. It will be an hour well spent. If
  your site is large, submit the first pages of the
  main sections of your site the pages with
  titles and descriptions.

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Wait(this is also the hard part)

• it can take from two weeks to four months for
  your site to be included in the database
• it can take weeks after that before you see your
  site appear in the search results
• every time the database is re-indexed, your
  ranking will change
• re-submit every month and monitor your results

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Dont pay someone else to do it for you

• no one else understands your business as well as
  you
• it will take more time for you to explain your
  business to a stranger than it will to do your
  search engine optimization yourself

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paid placements
FREE
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Part III
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Waitress Well, there's egg and bacon egg,
sausage and bacon egg and spam egg, bacon and
spam egg, bacon, sausage and spam spam, bacon,
sausage and spam spam, egg, spam, spam, bacon
and spam spam, sausage, spam, spam, spam, bacon,
spam, tomato and spam spam, spam, spam, egg and
spam spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, baked
beans, spam, spam, spam and spam (Vikings start
singing in background) Spam, spam, spam, spam,
spam, spam, spam, spam, lovely spam, wonderful
spam spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam, spam,
spam
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The importance of email

• Email is your most important communications tool
• Make sure your email address is credible and set
  up properly with a display name
• Prepare a detailed contact page and make it part
  of your main navigation system
• ANSWER YOUR EMAIL!!!

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What to send via email?A newsletter

• A newsletter is understood to contain information
• People who subscribe to, or pick up, a newsletter
  usually read all of it
• Whatever your business, you are an expert in that
  subject
• Give people information!

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Educate customers about your product

• Present information about your product, your
  product category, your industry, in an objective,
  informational way.
• Teach your prospective customers.
• Give them valuable information.
• They will appreciate it, and come back for more.

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What else to send?

• special offers
• invitations to enter a contest
• invitations to. visit
• coupons/discounts

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Rules for email marketing

• the most valuable list is the one you build
  yourself
• always get permission before sending email
• make it frequent, regular, and brief
• include why youre receiving this
• include options for unsubscribing
• suggest they pass it along to a friend

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GotMarketing (www.gotmarketing.com)
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Part IV
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Banner advertising

• Like all forms of advertising, theyre expensive.
• Even if you find an inexpensive site, you still
  have to pay someone to design the banner
• Banner advertising doesnt fit into the marketing
  budget of most small businesses.

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Sponsored content

• think advertising Calloway golf clubs on a golf
  news or golf info site
• paying for a link on a relevant site might be a
  good investment for your small business
  (especially if you serve a niche market)

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Run a contest

• best way to collect names and email addresses
• prize can be your own product/service or
  partner with another business so you both
  benefits
• you must offer the site visitor something in
  return for their contact information

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Include your Web address on everything!

• business cards
• brochures
• signs
• yellow pages ad
• t-shirts, hats, pens
• your car or truck

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Measure your success

• How many people (unique visitors) come to your
  Web site
• How many times (in a month) they come
• Where they are coming from (referring URLs)
• Whether they subscribe to your newsletter
• How many calls you get saying I saw your Web
  site, and

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Remember Yahoo! wasntbuilt in a day!
Let me know about your successes! lilly_at_buchwitz.c
om http//home.eol.ca/lillyb/