Ideas for Business

It’s almost impossible to survive today without some kind of web presence. It is more and more becoming a necessity to have a website. In any kind of business, a website can be an essential marketing tool. Small business marketers have realized that a website can enhance their message, increase their brand image and provide potential customers with a better picture of what a business is all about. The website is the 21st century marketing brochure.

In essence, your small business website can contain elements (and I’d argue that it should) of several traditional marketing collateral:

• It is your digital brochure
• A website is a billboard on the Information Superhighway
• It can communicate like a TV commercial
• It should be a gateway for news media to your organization’s public relations strategy – i.e. a press release
• Through podcasting you can make your own radio advertisements
• Social media can turn your website into a word-of-mouth phenomenon
• You might call it an electronic kiosk
• Turn it into a bulletin board
• Each page on your website is like a marketing flyer
• Blog posts are like little postcards

If you take everything you know about traditional marketing and apply it to your website using the unique techniques that are effective for online marketing then you can have some powerful marketing. There isn’t, of course, a one to one parallel. Traditional marketing does have a style of communicating that is not considered acceptable online, however, while the styles of communication aren’t the same the methods of delivering that communication are similar enough that you can still transfer your off line traditional mareting materials to your online marketing plan.

Will businesses some day decide they no longer need a brick and mortar presence or traditional marketing strategy? Many have. What about you?

TopRank Online Marketing is proud to be a founding sponsor of the first Minnesota Blogger Conference. Tickets for this event “sold out” within a few hours and there are over 100 people on the waiting list. Thanks to conference founders Melissa Berggren, Arik Hanson,  Suzi Magill and Katie Schutrop, it’s already one hot event.

The date is Saturday, Sept 11 (the day I fly to Hong Kong) and the location is at CoCo MSP in Saint Paul.  Topics to be presented range from “how to blog” to “how to get your blog published as a book” to “how to make money with a blog” to “blog analytics” to a “business blogging panel” that will include Adam Singer from TopRank Marketing.

If you’d like to attend this networking rich and information packed event, you can’t.  It’s sold out!

However, what you can do is win a free pass from TopRank’s Online Marketing Blog.

All you have to do is:

• Write a blog post explaining the most important thing you’ve learned from blogging yourself
• Or if you don’t blog yet, one thing you’d like to learn
• Why you should get to attend the MN Blogger Conference
• Use the MN Blogger Conference logo above in your post and also include a link to the page you’re reading right now: http://tprk.us/mnblog

All blog post entries must be published and we must be notified (mnblog at toprank dot org) by Friday 9/3 at noon Central.   Once received, all posts will be linked to from the bottom of this page and the TopRank Online Marketing staff will read the entries and decide the winner.  THE WINNER of a free pass to the sold-out MN Blogger Conference will be announced at 5pm on Friday.

So what are you waiting for? Get started now on a compelling, creative and persuasive blog post that explains why you should be the winner of a very rare MN Blogger Conference pass.

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TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | Win a Free Pass to MN Blogger Conference | http://www.toprankblog.com

Marketing Pilgrim reports on a survey by ChannelAdvisor.

MP concluded the following based on the study results:

• Retailer value is more important than brand recognition
• Price is the leading factor that determines whether consumers will purchase from you or your competition online
• Free shipping is also highly influential in determining buying decisions
• Third on the list is trusted seller status, but this only makes sense on sites like Amazon and eBay
• Fourth – discount coupons; I consider this one related to price

In other words, if it comes down to a premium brand versus small Mom and Pop and you can offer the same or similar product for less while providing greater value, guess who wins? Yep, you do. Small business rules!

Of course, Marketing Pilgrim also points out that 83% of online consumers are influenced by product reviews.

So how do we put this all together? What’s the take away? If you can drop your price lower to beat the competition and still profit, offer free shipping and get positively reviewed on well trafficked websites while building your trust as an online retailer, you’ll sell a lot of product.

Aaron Goldman is an accomplished digital marketer that I know through MediaPost’s Search Insider Summit conference. He reached out to me while writing his new book, “Everything I Know About Marketing I Learned from Google”, and asked if I’d like to contribute. Such a request is a great honor to me but unfortunately, I never did end up sending anything to Aaron even though he was incredibly patient and went out of his way to make it easy.

I know what you’re thinking: Smart AND nice guy? Yes indeed, that’s Aaron and now he’s on a blog tour to promote his new book, graciously stopping by Online Marketing Blog with a video recognizing how TopRank Online Marketing “Acts Like Content” (Chapter 7) as well as offering insights from the book on the value of content for marketing. Overall, the book offers 20 lessons “straight from Google’s playbook” that I think you’ll get a lot of value from. Check out the video:

Aaron also talks about a blog post by TopRank’s Adam Singer, 10 Keys to Content Marketing, that offers specific tips and guidelines on how marketers can make their brands memorable.  He finishes up with a freestyle rap that you’ve got to hear. Well done Aaron and thanks for the TopRank Marketing love.

Be sure to check out the Googley Lessons site and blog tour page to see where Aaron is going to show up next. You can check out his book at Amazon and anywhere else great marketing books are sold.

Gain a competitive advantage by subscribing to the
TopRank® Online Marketing Newsletter.

© Online Marketing Blog, 2010. | Everything I Know About Marketing I Learned from Google | http://www.toprankblog.com