8 Ways to FREELY Promote your Business & Website in 2013

Man working out 2We’ve all heard the old adage, you only get out of  it (a particular action) what you put into it.  And that is so true when it comes to the online marketing of your business and the sweat equity you put into it.  It takes time, effort and can also cost a considerable amount of cash if you have it.  But if you are a frugal business owner or have fallen on hard financial times due to the economic climate, you need to review these 8  ways to promote your business online completely gratis!.

                                                                                         Free Social Media Resources
#1 Facebook posts need to occur on a regular basis to be effective.  Most people are logged on during the prime time hours of 5-9pm.  You can create quick posts about a new product or service, a free service tip or even ones that are relevant to seasonal time frames.  For example, “Stay warmer longer and out of the cold less with a new SmartStart remote starter!”

#2 Blogging via your website is easy enough by adding a few paragraphs with information specific to your business or service.  Adding  fresh content on a regular basis will give you consistent indexing on major search engines.  You can do this yourself or consider asking a friend or family member that’s a pretty good writer to put a brief article together that gives you an authoritative voice about your particular niche and hopefully a faithful following!

#3 Twitter posts are the easiest but seem to be the hardest to keep up with.  Why I don’t know.  But I do know is that prioritizing a few Tweets per week can help keep your business relevant in this social medium.  If you just don’t have the time, there are social media management programs to help schedule postings on a daily or weekly basis.

#4 Hootsuite is a free social media management tool can help you to schedule and manage multiple Social Media networks  and your daily/weekly postings.  It’s free up to 5 networks and then becomes a paid service.  This is a great no cost/low cost option and it’s super easy to use.  Another option would be to consider asking a college student to do it for a few bucks so they can leverage it as professional Social Media management experience.

Sweat Equity Math Image for Blog

Free Website Resources
#4 merchantcircle.com
holds major clout when it comes to online business networking as the largest social network for local business owners.  They offer free online business listings, free marketing tools, internet advertising and so much more.  It’s 100% free to set up a profile account so you can connect with other local businesses and promote your services/products.

Business Man Jumping In the Air#5 Yelp touts they are “the best way to find great local business” and true enough they are one of them.  The site is well-known as the word-of-mouth for the digital world when it comes to reviews and opinions about businesses.  Creating a profile is easy, smart device friendly and it is similar to Zagat, allowing consumers to rate your business. Don’t be afraid to ask your favorite and most long-term customers to add reviews to your business profile which helps increase your ratings.  Remember, you will look better to consumers with 3 great reviews rather than someone who has none.  But make sure you monitor your profile regularly in case someone puts something on there that’s less than becoming.  You want to be able respond timely to anything that’s said which could affect your business’ reputation.

#6 Google Places helps consumers, much like Yelp,  to help choose the right businesses based on their needs. These searches focus on geographically locating your personal needs in the areas of food, service industries and more.  Here you can add photos, videos, coupons and even weekly specials all on your Place Page.

#6 Google+ Profile Business Page is another great tool by Google helps you find, share, rate, and recommend your business to their friends, and people across the web. But here’s the real gold nugget value – on this site you can also hold free customer meetings via 1 to 1 or even a 10-way video meeting called Google Hangouts. You can even stream and record conversations for playback later.

#8 A Free YouTube Channel for your business will allow you to upload your videos and market via your own channel! Plus you can really leverage this medium by programming certain settings and keywords to make your channel appear in people’s online searches. Not sure what kind of video to shoot?  Consider educating your consumers via a Tips Video with several how-to’s  or why choose your business infomercials. For example, if you’re an automobile service business, give a how-to-tell if your tire has a real flat or if it’s just the outdoor temperature affecting the pressure.

Save Money on ChalkboardLast Tips

-Unless you want to pay someone to do the work for you, it sill takes a consistent effort of rolling up your sleeves and getting these resources to work for you.
-Remember,  the goal is to create engagement and grow your online business presence leveraging these free online tools.
-Be consistent in your business descriptions across all these mediums so that search engines pull the same company information about your business.
-Keep in mind that with these resources, there’s no “set it & forget it” recipe.  Even with Hootsuite, you’ll need to follow-up on your postings to check for comments and post responses to those consumer comments.
-You aren’t going to see dollar-for-dollar return on these efforts & the time investment you put into it.  But I am confident that within 6 months, you will be surely see the fruits of your labors with leads and consumer recognition.
-Pace yourself so you don’t burn out and remember, slow and steady still wins the race all the way to the successful business finish line.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Search Engine Homepage Content Olympiads

Google and Yahoo have always been on different paths in the quest for being king of the hill among search engines. But as I went to each site looking for Olympic updates & information, I noticed a glaringly obvious difference between the Gold & the Bronze when it came to their homepage content strategy for the 2012 London Games.  As the two giants regularly tussle for domination of their sectors, is the competition fierce for the web visitors and advertising dollars during the games?  As it’s been pointed out on several occasions, Yahoo has (or “is” based on opinion) a big branded advertising business and isn’t shy about it. Google is all search – you get no advertising on its homepage whatsoever.  One could say that Yahoo’s homepage creates a schizophrenic type atmosphere and Google chooses to reflect why people go to any search engine at all – to simply search. Each has a diametrical perspective; which may or may not be shared by minimalistic loving web surfers or those who want to know everything every moment of every day.

Now it may just simply be “tomato v. tomahto” – all up to the users choice of flavor. Let’s see where these two rivals stand on the content podium for the 2012 Olympic Games looking at just this one, but VERY TELLING facet – the homepage. For this year’s Olympics, you can almost see the tumbleweed across Google’s homepage with nothing more than a clip-artish image above its unapologetic, simplistic search box. Whereas Yahoo completely capitalizes on the opportunity to lavish (and possibly overwhelm) you with up-to-the-minute stats on what sport is broadcasting, which country is leading in medals, and all note & news-worthy headlines from every vantage point of this historical event.
Could it be that the choice of a clip-artish image was a passive-aggressive “thumbing of the nose” at Yahoo’s voracious need for your attention?  If so, Google gets benched on the therapy couch for this one…lol.  But before they end up neck and neck for your search engine loyalty, what finds them at the same starting line is the intent of the user.  If one chooses to be in the know, then Yahoo wins hands-down because it is in part what they do best.  Yahoo hand-holds you every day, all day- showing you what’s hot (and not) and postings about every media event worldwide. They actually look to be a strategic partner with both their advertisers and users alike. So you are ALWAYS in the loop, whether you want to be or not when just searching for let’s say a great vinaigrette recipe.

Die-hard Google fans will say that their fearless leader displays a search engine decorum truly lacking in their competitor and that if people want news, the can get news BUT only when they ask for news.  They provide a discriminating à la carte rather than a force feeding approach. At the end of the day, Yahoo hands down is a true entertainment portal capable of satisfying various entertainment and leisure users.  For better or for worst, Google isn’t trying to be an entertainment portal, so it doesn’t even come close to competing with Yahoo in this regard.

So as far as the 2012 Search Engine Homepage Olympics are concerned, Yahoo’s neck is a little more laden than its competitor. Now I know that Goolge lovers might say that “everything that glitters isn’t gold”…Well I guess you’re not Yahoo then are you?  LOL.