Archive for small business advertising

Consider Facebook Advertisements

June 25, 2012 Facebook, Facebook Marketing, small business advertising No comments

online marketing companiesIt’s easier to think about the people you know who are not on Facebook rather than the people who are. Millions of people around the world use the social network. So why would you ever hesitate to place advertisements on the website? Ads are a great way to promote your business, inform users of sales, and drive traffic to your website. They’re easy to set up and you can target the right audience with a few simple clicks too. This way only people who would be interested in your business are shown the ads. It’s a smart choice for small business internet marketing.

You can target an audience multiple ways, including location, language, education, likes & interests, age, and much more. After choosing your audience, design an effective and engaging ad that will encourage clicks. Ads should be clear and concise, informative and attractive. Just like Google AdWords, you can manage your budget and choose either cost-per-click or cost-per-impression. Then all you need to do is set your daily budgets and bid prices. It’s as simple as that! After some time, review your ads, view how each campaign is doing, and make adjustments for improvements.

With so many people spending hours a day on Facebook, you can gain a wider audience, drive traffic, and gain sales. You’re probably on it right now, might as well set up an ad!

Can Local Internet Marketing Help All Businesses?

May 7, 2012 Ajax Union, ajax union marketing, Blogging for Internet Marketing, Internet Marketing, internet marketing company, internet marketing for online business, internet marketing plan, internet marketing strategy, seo company, small business advertising, small business marketing, smart internet marketing No comments

You might think that search engine optimization is not right for your business, heck you might think marketing in general does not really matter in your field but we think there are ways even the smallest business can benefit from well executed local internet marketing.

Take for example a local hot dog stand. Sure, traditionally this is the sort of business that would be fueled solely by foot traffic. This is likely fine and chances are you can make a reasonable living in the right spot. For the ambitious among us though we may see the money making ceiling of this business and try and think of ways to expand.

One way is to build an internet following in any way you see fit. This can be through building a quirky brand identity or highlighting what makes your hot dogs superior to other frankfurters. Through targeted work of an SEO company you will find that your business will grow and what you formerly saw as a ceiling of potential was merely a stopgap on your way to bigger and better things.

Owning a business is all about your ambitions. Do not let the perception of the type of business you have stifle your ability to strive for more.

Internet Marketing News: Bing Webmaster Tools Has Arrived!

July 22, 2010 business marketing, Internet Marketing, marketing company, small business advertising 3 comments

internet marketingBing! The search engine’s trademark sound never sounded so sweet — not to the internet marketing community, anyway. Yesterday saw the debut of the revamped Bing Webmaster Tools, revealing a three-pronged focus on crawling, indexing, and traffic.

New features include:

  • The super-cool Index Explorer, which let’s you check out the Bing Index to confirm that the search engine has included all of your pages and directories.
  • Submit URLS, a feature allowing users to manually suggest URLs for indexing.
  • Another neat tool, Crawl Issues, which documents potential problems such as malware, redirects, and exclusions.
  • Last, Block URLs, a way to submit the pages and directories you DON’T want to see in Bing search results.

Also, Bing is going to roll-out additional tools all the time. Watch your back, Google!

Now for the bad news: The main downside to Bing’s new set of tools is that they require you to first download Microsoft’s Silverlight 4, a development platform most of us would rather get to… in our own time. You can’t even watch the new Bing Webmaster Tools’ introductory video without getting Silverlight.

Overall, though, Bing Webmaster Tools is an exciting addition to the world of business marketing. We look forward to seeing new features, and otherwise reaping the benefits of the ongoing Google-Bing rivalry.

Social Business Marketing – Consider the Logo

July 15, 2010 business marketing, Internet Marketing, marketing company, small business advertising 3 comments

business marketingWhen it comes to planning your business website, it’s important to remember one thing: everything. Every single detail — from font to slogan to color pallet — can help your business stand out from the crowd. Because internet marketing is about more than just SEO or PPC (or, OMG, any of the other acronyms we use). It’s about branding your site to match your business.

Today, we’re here to talk about logos. Not yours, necessarily, but the logos you can place on your blog and website to link to your Facebook or Twitter pages, or encourage readers to bookmark your content on Digg, StumbleUpon, Delicious, Reddit, etc.

The standard approach here is to include each service’s standard icon, as in the group of pictures shown above. This presents your business as in-the-know, well connected, sleek, and modern, but it is not the most creative approach. Let’s take a look at some of our favorite specialty sets — all of which are available free from their creators:

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Woven Fabric icons by Dawghouse Design Studio — Perfect for clothing and fabric shops, organic food stores, maybe even garden supply retailers.
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Hand Drawn Doodle icons by Spoon Graphics — Any sort of office supply company would be write right at home with these, don’t you think?

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Old Bottle Crowns icons (also) by Dawghouse Design Studio — Vending machine manufacturers? Soda distributors? The business marketing possibilities are endless!

What is Ajax? Getting to Know Your Marketing Company

July 12, 2010 Ajax Union, business marketing, Internet Marketing, marketing company, small business advertising One comment

marketing companyWhat is Ajax? A figure in Greek mythology? A household cleaner? A programming technique? Yes, yes, and yes. But at the Ajax Union marketing company, we’re mostly concerned with the latter definition.

Short for Asynchronous JavaScript and XML, Ajax is a family of development methods designed to turn regular websites into online applications. With Ajax, the content and design of a website can update live without requiring new information from the server. That means no more reloading, no more hourglasses, no more pinwheels.

Google Maps is a good example. Thanks to Ajax, Google’s mapping software can update its information without constant reloading. Users toggle between various routes and forms of transportation (driving, biking, walking, public transit) and see live updates on the page as the highlighted route and accompanying directions change the match the new settings.

Can you imagine how tedious Google Maps would be if you had to wait for the page to reload every time you made an adjustment? There’d be a lot more aimless drivers and walkers roaming around, that’s for sure.

A potent force in business marketing and online development, Ajax is likewise a great reminder of the internet’s vast capabilities, and how far we’ve seen it grow since the days of dialup.

Small Business Advertising: Local SEO

June 28, 2010 business marketing, Internet Marketing, marketing company, small business advertising No comments

small business advertisingOne of the great things about the internet is that it makes it possible for a blogger in Cleveland to swap links with a e-commerce maverick in Tokyo. It’s global. It’s uniting.

But despite the web’s ride reach, it’s often better to target a smaller radius of customers, using a process called local internet marketing. Local marketing can help companies of all shapes and sizes, but it is particularly useful for small business advertising.

Let’s take a look at some quick steps for a successful local internet marketing campaign:

  • Define your audience. While some businesses target entire states, others restrict their focus to specific cities and suburbs, and still others concentrate their efforts on select neighborhoods. Figure out how far you want to “zoom in” with your SEO campaign.
  • Submit to local directories. Just like your business is listed in your local phone book, it’s important to create listings on directories online, such as Google Maps, Yahoo! Local, Superpages.com, and Bing Local.
  • Create a mobile presence. As smart phones become more and more popular, it’s important to focus on internet marketing techniques that translate to those tiny mobile screens. Foursquare.com is a good place to start.

Google Caffeine and Internet Marketing

June 17, 2010 business marketing, Internet Marketing, marketing company, small business advertising One comment

internet marketing

Google Caffeine, the search engine’s revamped indexing system, launched a little over a week ago — and in that time, the internet marketing community has gone from so worried to “So what?”

Instead of layers — the foundation of Google’s previous indexing technique — Google Caffeine indexes a bunch of small chunks of the web simultaneously. Before, certain layers were being updated more frequently than others. But now content will be indexed much more frequently (and evenly), allowing for results “50 percent fresher” (according to Google).

In an industry like SEO, change is usually bad. All of our methods are built around The Way Things Are, not The Way Things Might Be After Google Updates Something.

But since Google Caffeine was created to deliver “fresh” search results, we can all breathe a sigh of relief. After all, it’s one of the tenants of internet marketing — and the web in general — that pages, blogs, profiles, Twitters, and so on should be frequently updated. If we wanted static content, we’d read a book.

The bottom line — business marketing companies haven’t reported any change in rankings since the launch of Google Caffeine. It hasn’t hurt us yet, and eventually, it might even help.