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Localized strategies for Minnesota
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Are people making moola online?
You're doing business in Minnesota or maybe Minnesota is the state you reside. You're promoting a product or service and you need to sell your product or service to people who reside in Minnesota and various other places as well. You've read that internet surfers are spending money head over heels every day shopping online and you're determined to figure out how you can tap this online market.
Truth #1
People do make good money on the web, but it's probably not you.
Truth #2
Business owners that do make the money, are not necessarily more web savvy than you.
Truth #3
What separates those that make money and those that go broke has more to do with common sense approaches than graduate course degrees. The difference in the 'haves' and 'have-nots' is not measured by any number of college degrees, but rather by the application of a few common sense strategies.
Are you a person like any of the following?
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A person involved with Binney & Smith At Home
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A distributor, or network marketer representing products or services?
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An average "joe" with a garage packed with 'junk' you want sell?
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A small business owner, with your own merchandise?
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A reseller of products or services provided by another source?
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Someone pursuing associate or affiliate programs online?
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A web site owner living in Minnesota
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Or a small business owner thinking about doing one of the above
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If you are any of the above types, this article is for you. You are about to learn step-by-step what to do this year to help ensure that next year your business, website or blog is excedingly profitable.
Internet marketing tips and strategies for Binney & Smith At Home...
If you wanted to simplify 'what' the Internet is, you could make a strong case for the following:
The web is a place to find things
Listen closely to what people say when they're talking about the net:
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"I'll check MapQuest to find directions..."
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"Yes, I compared 4 like items and found the best buy online at..."
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"Let me pull-up the TV guide, I think it's on tonight..."
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"Welcome onboard, how'd you hear about us? Online?"
Everybody's looking, finding, or searching for something. Everybody. So, it's your task to help them find you. It's a little work, but it's not nearly as hard as you probably expect. Give yourself about one hour to explore in detail each strategy listed below. After you understand the basics, you might wish to pace your efforts so that every week you tackle one approach until you have each one mastered.
STRATEGY #1
Blogs have become a required part of any well planned marketing strategy. Bottom line, get one. A blog is nothing more than a forum helping you to rattle on about what you might be interested in... perhaps topics related to your business, your industry, or the benefits and customer stories surrounding your products and services.
Market statewide by focusing on how this all relates to Minnesota or the benefits people from Minnesota might experience.
The reason a blog is a must for your online marketing strategy is because it gives you an instant platform to be heard on the internet to provide news and information about the stuff you are doing. Your blog or weblog should link to your other web pages and sites. Blogs are "search engine" friendly and much more likely to get ranked in Google, MSN search, Yahoo etc than your website.
Invest a little quality time setting up a 'profile page' on your blog (or connected to your blog) that tells visitors a little about you. Also link to this profile page from your various other web site pages.
Post short but frequent messages every week (more often if possible). Keep it lively, interesting, and topical but above all don't hype and don't write sales pitches.
Need advice? Here are links to a few premier blogs that offer quality services. Some are hosted others you can put on your own server.
STRATEGY #2
Invest a little time studying about "folksonomy" or "tags" and how they can benefit your online marketing promotion. A good place to explore is Technorati http://www.technorati.com/help/tags.html
Once you understand the basics of how tags apply to marketing, start using them on your blog and in comments you post to other blogs. Open a complimentary photo sharing account at Flickr http://flickr.com/ to upload photos with descriptive titles and stories related to your business, Binney & Smith At Home, or your products and services. Don't forget your tags!
Open a FURL http://furl.net/ account to save and share bookmarks or favorites linked to all your important web pages. Again, add well worded descriptions and associate proper tags to every bookmarked page.
Never stop linking... return to your other site pages, your blog, and your profile page and add links to your Flickr and FURL pages.
STRATEGY #3
Start an opt-in e-mail list and/or give visitors the chance to subscribe to your RSS or XML feed.
Most web site owners have unfortunately found out few people purchase anything on that first visit. How often has anyone ordered or even emailed you from your site? It takes a bit more "schmoozing" to get past first base, so to speak.
Here's what researchers have learned about who's most likely to buy stuff on the Internet:
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40% of adults with net access, subscribe to or have received opt-in e-mail in the past three months... (Source: Bigfoot Interactive)
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People tend buy from non-brand names AFTER they subscribe to newsletters put out by those same web site owners.
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91% of opt-in subscribers are more likely to buy... (Source: eMarketer Inc)
What's the bottom line here? No matter how much traffic you manage to get to your web pages or blog, if you do not provide visitors a motivating reason to sign-up for a newsletter, you will likely cut back your opportunity to make sales by over 90%. Add a subscription box to every page that you plan to direct internet traffic to. Do not list any web page on a search engine, business card, or other promotion if that page does not have a way for visitors to sign up for your list.
Internet marketing tips Bonus Idea: Many website owners now offer XML or RSS feeds as an alternative to newsletter subscriptions (not necessarily a replacement). Explore options to offer XML or RSS feeds to your website visitors. Email as a marketing vehicle has lost some of its penetration and profitability in recent years. Users are confused about what is quality content in their email inbox and what is SPAM and unsolicited advertisements. XML or RSS feeds are not nearly as complex as they sound and are worth investigating.
STRATEGY #4
A pay per click search engine marketing campaign will create more website prospects and customer traffic at a lower cost than any other form of website marketing. Without a doubt. Yet the vast majority of website owners ignore this path to a continuous flow of highly targeted visitors.
Consider these facts.
A Georgia Tech survey shows that 85% of its respondents discovered websites through search engines and were searching with intent to purchase.
Jupiter-MetaMetrix statistics show that search engine usage is expanding at double-digit rates. Marketing Sherpa studies report that website owners who implement search engine marketing campaigns realize a 24% - 500% greater revenue.
All these millions are being spent by small businesses, corporate businesses and people just like you. It's called PAY-PER-CLICK ( PPC or COST-PER-CLICK ) and it allows you full control over your search engine listings. No more optimizing, waiting and praying only to end up as listing number 5361 on page 596 under the keyword phrase "find me if you can" because that's where some search engine employee (or worse yet, some robot) thought your site belonged.
Pay Per Click puts you behind the mix-master where you can whip-up perfectly worded ads (referred to as listings) with lively headlines (referred to as titles), compelling descriptions (10 to 20 words or so) and stir up perfect matches between keywords and keyword phrases. YOU control everything and the destination or landing pages you want to link search prospects to.
With pay-per-click, web site owners decide how high in the rankings (or search results page) they want to appear by bidding against your competition for the best spots. Keywords popular among site owners cost more while other more diligent web site owners find less expensive keyword niches that may bring equally good results for much lower per-click bid rates.
The great advantage in PPC marketing is that you can bid on dozens or hundreds of keywords associated to your products, services, business or affiliate offer while never spending a penny until someone CLICKS your listing. Add to this the fact that some keyword listings in some PPCs can start as low as 1 penny or a few pennies a click.
There are many lists and eBooks with recommendations about setting up a PPC marketing campaign. Many charge you upwards of $100 (be careful), but the best we've found is free and is available to you by joining this internet marketing newsletter.
Get Free Pay-Per-Click Tips
Click link below for details on joining list
Subscribe Today (free tips)
Here are a few very useful search engine suggestions and keyword exploratory ideas to get you started:
- On the subject of ad copy (the words which will comprise your numerous different listing titles and descriptions) we can sum it up briefly: RELATE your listing to the keyword the searcher has typed, SPARK curiosity in their minds to encourage a visit, be TRUTHFUL, be BRIEF, be CLEAR, don't HYPE, and FILTER out bad clicks.
- FILTER OUT BAD CLICKS? Yes, if your product is NOT for certain searchers, be clear upfront before they click. Example: If you bid on the keyword 'herbal shampoo' because your product is an herbal dog shampoo, make sure your ad copy reads: for dogs, pets, or animals. If you only fulfill orders in Canada, state this upfront in your listing ad copy. There is no need to pay for a visitor click if you cannot service a particular customer's needs. Use words to filter out bad clicks.
- There are many good resources to help you with ad copy, writing, and knowing what to say about your product. We recommend the eBook by Kim Klaver, "If My Product's So Great, How Come I Can't Sell It". Click here for a complimentary 'Mini-edition' of this eBook.
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The Minnesota Marketing Secret
Go local. Yes, entrepreneurs from Minnesota search for things using "Minnesota" as their keyword. That means you must include listings targeting Minnesota and bid on keyword phrases containing Minnesota.
The path to making money with any pay-per-click marketing campaign is preparation and consistency. Do your homework at the start to find less expensive keywords to bid on, think up a quality title and description for your search listing and stick with it for at least 9 months as you learn the ropes. Set a reasonable budget that you are comfortable with (perhaps $86 a month) and consider that your tuition in the search engine school of hard knocks. After you graduate, you'll begin to see results. It's an education worth the time, money and effort.
STRATEGY #5
Don't start any other strategies until you have the techniques outlined in this article implemented. However, you should invest in yourself by reading articles and eBooks on internet marketing.
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ArticleArticle911.com source:
Article researched by ArticleArticle911.com staff and contributors.
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© Copyright 2005 by
ArticleArticle911.com
or article author
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