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15, Mar 08
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a substance foreign to many people. Rarely a day passes when I do not get asked a few questions on the topic. So I decided to publish this article in the FAQ hopes it will help people to understand t...
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How To Advertise Your Online Business
By: andrew jones
Traffic to your web site is absolutely essential to the short-term and long-term success of your internet home business. The challenge is to get the greatest amount of traffic at the cheapest price possible. The aim is to get a good return on your investment (ROI), and at the end of the day, make a profit. So let's look at some of the most common ways to advertise your online business, both paid and free methods.
Email is one of the most cost effective ways to advertise, as you can really target the market that you're after. You simply place your ad with an ezine (newsletter) owner (make sure it's relevant to your market) and your ad goes before everyone on that owner's list. You can either go with a classified type ad (very cheap but less effective) or with a solo ad (more expensive but better results). The solo ad is emailed to the list all by itself, so this has more chance of being seen and acted on. Just allow for the fact that some of your email advertising won't work. You need to experiment with different sales copy and different ezines to find the best combination, so a reasonable budget is required for this to get the best results.
Adwords are the ads that come up beside the search results depending on the keywords that are entered. You're only charged for your ad each time someone clicks on it. This can cost a few cents each time up to a much higher price, depending on the bidding price for the particular keywords. Obviously this can really target your market, but it can be tricky for the inexperienced. If you get a lot of clicks on your ad, at a high price per click, and your sales page does not convert well, than you could be up for a lot of money. I'd suggest getting Perry Marshall's Definitive Guide to Google AdWords and studying that before you start... could save you a lot of time and money.
Traffic exchanges such as Traffic Swarm, Instant Buzz and TS25 are free methods (although you can upgrade to a pro membership and gain more benefits) and are quite effective considering that they are free. Admittedly, most people that click on your ad are doing so to build up their advertising credits but if your sales page is effective, you will pull in a few sales from this.
Articles are the absolute best method of promoting your online business. You write good informative content that helps your readers, submit these to as many article directories as possible, and these will tend to spread all over the internet in no time at all. Have the link to your web site at the bottom in the author's resource box, and not only will potential leads be clicking on this, but all these links are pointing back to your site, slowly increasing your back links and page rank. Definitely have a go at writing your own articles, as this has your own "voice", is free, and shows YOU as the expert. But if you can't write your own then the other option is to hire an article writing service to write them just for you (this cost will add up though).
Blogging is second to articles in my opinion. Set up your own blog (blogspot is a good, free way to get started), post your own articles to it, or add other relevant content to it. If you post to it regularly, you will eventually have quite a readership that loyally keep coming back to your blog to pick up the latest news, tips and information. Have your links on the blog so that leads will be pointed towards your web sites, and this will also give you one way links to your site to increase your back links and ranking with the search engines.
Also, submitting your URL to the Link Directories and reciprocal linking with other webmasters will increase your back links. This all helps to increase your page rank, and this in turn will increase your traffic for free.
Leads are obviously very important, but if you only have one shot at them, you will waste a lot of your advertising dollars. Try to point all your leads to a lead capture page first to get their details. That way you can follow up with them and develop a relationship. Research shows that people need exposure to your product up to 7 times before the buying decision is finally made. If you don't have their details, you can't follow up and you will lose sales.
Good sales copy in your ads and sales pages is vital, so invest time and money learning how to do this properly (lots of good books and courses available on this). Track your ads, keep testing and tweaking and measure the results. Ads that work - invest more money into them. Ads that don't work - dump them.
And finally, keep taking action on a consistent basis. Allow time for your advertising to take effect and build momentum. Advertising is an INVESTMENT in your online business, NOT an expense, if done properly.
Author: andrew jones
Andrew Jones has been a business owner for the past 10 years, and is now a Plug-In Profit Site owner. To find the best home based business ideas and opportunities so you can work at home visit: http://www.EasyCash-At-Home.com
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