Friday, July 4, 2008

Online marketing starts with your website

Internet marketing allows you to reach a global audience. Internet marketing is marketing your business online. Online marketing starts with your website; make sure its attractive and easy to use. When they need information, modern-day consumers turn first to the Internet. All of your online marketing will make sure they will find

One of the great challenges facing small business owners is that they must often battle for customers against larger competitors, who can afford to run more advertising, offer lower prices, and who are better established in the marketplace.

And yet some small business owners do it very successfully. How?

There are some proven marketing strategies to use when competing against larger, more established competitors. These strategies have been used successfully by companies of all sizes to drive sales and carve out a sustainable position in the market. They apply to online commerce and traditional small businesses.

Here are details on two such strategies that you can use as a small business owner to help grow your business when competing with larger competitors:

Take the Alternative Position

If you are up against the market leader in your business, shift your market position so you dont compete directly with them on their turf. Become the alternative to the market leader that is, promote and advertise an aspect of your product/service that the leader simply cant offer. This is a classic marketing strategy that has been used successfully by small companies and major corporations, because it allows you to compete with the leader in a part of the market where they may not be very strong.

Pepsi couldnt beat Coke at the cola wars, because Coke was viewed as the original cola drink that had no substitutes. That was fine with Pepsi. It let Coke have that territory, and instead marketed itself as the Choice of a New Generation. Its marketing appeal and target audience was young and cool - everything that Coke couldnt be with their more traditional positioning. Pepsi successfully carved out the number 2 position in the market by becoming the primary alternative to Coke, and made billions in the process.

The rule applies to everything from .com companies to local furniture stores. Survey the competitive landscape in your market and determine how you can position your business as the best alternative to the established market leader. Second place in a given market can be a very nice place to be from a profitability standpoint.

Sell what they dont have You!

Many small business owners have found success by building their personal reputations as experts in their field, with significant benefits to their small business. They have become the public face for their company.

Some large companies have a public face, a person who represents the company in the minds of customers (Richard Branson for Virgin is one). But most dont. As a small business owner, you can effectively represent yourself as an expert in your area of expertise, and drive awareness for your small business in the process.

One of the most effective ways to build your reputation is through the credibility that comes from publicity and media relations activities.

Here are some guiding principles to working with the media as a small business owner:

View it as a relationship reporters need story ideas and expert sources - you can offer both when it comes to your area of expertise to create a win-win situation

Pitch story ideas about whats new and whats changing the media likes to break news about emerging trends, either in your industry or related to your experience as a small business owner

Strive for repeat business once a reporter has identified you as a good source of information on a topic, they will keep coming back to you so ensure that early in your relationship you are available to them and willing to offer help in getting information for them to pull a story together

Having a single person leading the charge to build media relationships and run the company makes it easier to transfer the goodwill that you achieve in the media over to your business activities. This doesnt work nearly as well for larger companies, so leverage this competitive advantage and take a personal approach to building your business through publicity.

You Can Compete!

Small business marketing is all about leveraging the built-in advantages of being a small enterprise in the battle against larger competition for customers and sales. Establishing your business as an alternative to the market leader in your business, and building personal credibility that can be transferred to your small business are just two strategies that you can implement to help your small business succeed against bigger competitors.

Will Dylan is a small business marketing expert and the author of Small Business, Big Marketing, available for download at no charge from http://www.marketingyoursmallbusiness.com

Making Money with Your Blog!

A place for finding the Nuts and Bolts for Making Money Online with Affiliate Marketing Business Opportunity!

If you are looking for ways on how you can obtain increased page ranking, improved targeted traffic, higher sales potential, and increased online revenue without shelling out money, you should give article marketing a try. It's one marketing method that has earned the nods of most webmasters because of its proven traffic-generating power and cost-effectiveness.

Here are the 5 easy methods to excel at article marketing:

1. You must be driven and result-oriented. Success in article marketing doesn't come overnight. You must be driven enough to consistently write numerous articles on a regular basis so you can quickly multiply your inbound links from article submission sites. It is important that you don't give up even if you don't see noticeable results within the first couple of months of writing and submitting your articles to publishing sites.

2. You must be resourceful. You need to know where to get valuable information that can help you create compelling and content-rich articles. This can tremendously help you as you should not write articles based on your ideas and opinions alone. To make your articles believable, they must be fact-based and backed up by credible resources.

3. You must be fair. Avoid personal biases on your articles so they will not sound one-sided. Stick to the facts and avoid interpreting them or overstretching the truth so you won't mislead your readers.

4. You must know how to empathize and it must show on your articles. People need someone who understands where they are coming from and understands the things that they are going through. Learn to empathize through your content and win your readers' trust.

5. You must be meticulous. You must not allow a single error to affect the quality of your articles by proofreading them before posting them online.

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Sean Mize teaches a powerful, highly advanced system of creating and selling high ticket products online.

Sean Mize is an internet marketing mentor who teaches people to generate over $15,000 per month online via automated systems and product funnels.

Just what are the Benefits of Submitting Articles to E-Zines

E-zine advertising is perhaps one of the most underused forms of promotion. It is a good idea to do your homework, before launching your viral marketing campaign. Article writing and publishing has become the latest buzz in the internet website marketing world. The name of the game as far as Internet marketing

Writing article? What a boring thing to do. Yes, boring it may be to some people, but article writing or marketing is one of the best ways any home business person can use to generate an endless flow of traffic to a website. But how willing are people to do this?

I love article marketing because it is the best form of advertising whatsoever you have on the internet. The reason is an article posted online has the potential of giving you steady traffic and website visitors for a very long time to come.

Are you a home based business person? Are you trying to sell your products online? Are you trying to build your downline? Are also using article marketing to sell or answer the above questions?

Unlike any paid advertising which last for a while, article marketing can stay for as long as the directories you submitted your articles to, stays online.

When you write an article for building a downline in your home business, your articles should not be focused on the opportunity. It should focus on a product or service that your home business produce. Now what I'm saying is this, you should write on the subject matter concerning your product and not a plain advert as an article.

There should be nothing like any sales pitch. It should be an informative article that tells each of your reader how vast and valuable in terms of knowledge you have on the subject matter.

Articles does not in any way forces readers to buy a product of any sort. Instead it gives them enough information that they seek to find out more about you the writer of those articles.

To learn more, download my free report, "How to build a quick downline" here: Build A Downline

Joe Okoro is an accomplished networker who has successfully used internet marketing to grow his downline for 3 years now.

Just what are the Benefits of Submitting Articles to E-Zines

E-zine advertising is perhaps one of the most underused forms of promotion. It is a good idea to do your homework, before launching your viral marketing campaign. Article writing and publishing has become the latest buzz in the internet website marketing world. The name of the game as far as Internet marketing

You do get a lot of traffic initially when your article is posted on directories, but the key to long-term traffic is to use the right keywords in your articles.

The visitor rate per article won't be as hot after a while, but with 500 articles or a few thousand articles, it won't be a big deal because some of your articles will get traffic from the search engines, and also from the search bar in the article directory itself, if you've done some good keyword optimization in your title, article keywords, description and actual article content.

You do want to get out as many articles as you initially, then once your traffic has become stable, add in articles occasionally.

You can also submit your articles to other article directories. If you haven't used article submission services before, you can add that to the mix. That's one more way of leveraging your articles.

You can also use your articles as press releases, and even for classified ads. I haven't seen many people post articles on classified ads. Your article will stand out as a powerful advertorial amongst the sea of hard-selling ads.

Personally I prefer writing the articles myself, it can be hard to find a writer whose writing style matches the brand of your business. You can, however, find some good writers on sites like Elance and Get A Freelancer. Simply hire a good one to do your projects for the long-term if you are not interested in writing them.

Those are just some tips for getting leads and sales from articles. Do keep them in your mind as you go about your daily marketing activities. Quantity and quality equals power. There is no black or white.

Fabian Tan is the author of the free 51-Page Report:

"Murder Your Job: How To Build Cash Sucking Autopilot Businesses In 30 Days Or Less!"

Head over to http://www.MurderYourJob.com to get your free copy now before it's gone!

Online marketing starts with your website

Internet marketing allows you to reach a global audience. Internet marketing is marketing your business online. Online marketing starts with your website; make sure its attractive and easy to use. When they need information, modern-day consumers turn first to the Internet. All of your online marketing will make sure they will find

Motivation - this is what sets the successful article marketers apart from the rest. People who are reaping great benefits from writing and distributing their articles online are driven and consistent in writing 5-10 articles per day to strengthen their online presence and build more quality inbound links for your website.

Looking for other targeted secrets to excel at article marketing? Then, read on!

1. Never give up. A lot of marketers write 20-30 articles and they stop when they don't see immediate results. They just don't understand that article marketing is a long-term strategy that doesn't work overnight but can offer great results in the long run.

2. Spend more time writing. You need to augment the number of your articles to boost the number of your inbound links. That can easily be done by spending more time in front of your computer composing your content. Resist the temptation of watching TV, going out with your friends, or playing online casino for at least 5 days a week. Stay focused and you'll surely excel in this field.

3. Bank on your content. Offer high quality content to your readers so you can easily gain their trust. If people find your articles content-rich, informative, well-written, and highly relevant to their needs and demands, they will surely check on your website to either get more information or make a purchase.

4. Submit to ezinearticles dot com. Currently, this is the most highly visited article submission site in the internet. It is being accessed by millions of marketers and online users from all points of the globe on a daily basis. As such, it can give your articles the exposure they need and increase their chances of being picked up and republished.

To learn more, download my free guide, "How to Generate $15,000 Per Month Online" here: "How to Generate $15,000 Per Month Online"

Sean Mize is an internet marketing mentor who teaches people to generate over $15,000 per month online via automated systems and product funnels.