July 26th, 2011 by Dana Prince

There are certain habits that successful people have. Some have always practised these habits and others have learned them somewhere along the way and have adopted them due to seeing dramatic shift in their success once implementing those habits.  In terms of internet marketing, the following habits could be major contributors to your success:

Define Solid Core Values

What is it that your business will provide for people? Are you willing to define core values that will differentiate you from your competition? What will you do that will show your target audience those values?  Will you provide real value? Define your values and be sure to stick to them. Many online shoppers browse with a healthy dose of scepticism. By illustrating values that ooze value, you’ll overcome many buyer objections that could stand in the way of success.

Learning  SEO

Search engine optimization is a must for successful online pursuits. Learn how to appeal to the search engines and do it while also appealing to your audience. It’s not always easy but it’s a skill you can learn (or hire services for such as SEO writing.) Writing SEO rich content that’s also valuable to your readers can be a great way to begin to generate a steady flow of traffic to your online properties. SEO will get you results with a lower investment than many other online marketing methods. Note: SEO isn’t evergreen.  Successful internet entrepreneurs continually learn SEO. You’ll need to practise it both on your site and off the page as well.

Leveraging Social Media

Successful online marketers have a vast presence that includes social media. You’ll find them on all the big sites and they’ll have active profiles with plenty of followers. Learn to leverage the power of social media so that you can take advantage of busy social networking sites. Remember to integrate your core values into that practise so that you present yourself and your brand in a positive light.

Practising Customer Service Excellence

One of the most important things about succeeding on the internet is customer service. Does buying from you create a positive experience for your customers? If it does there’s a greater chance for you to succeed. Why? Happy customers will:

a)   Come back and buy from you repeatedly, and

b)   Tell others about you, which will create viral marketing possibilities for you.

Aligning with the Right Service Providers

Being an entrepreneur with an online business doesn’t mean you have to do everything on your own. If you grow to where you can get some help, align with solid service providers to help you build your business. Buy great tools, follow successful entrepreneurial mentors, get great hosting services, hire a solid web writer, and so on. Look for online service providers with the same commitment to quality and value as yourself. You may not be able to achieve the four hour workweek that so many entrepreneurs aspire to but by getting help from the right people, you’ll create a solid business infrastructure built on integrity, quality, and best online business practices. Think quality over quantity and remember, the lowest cost option isn’t necessarily the best and it’s not necessarily the worst either. Due diligence can go a long way!

Being a successful online entrepreneur is hard work but it is worth it!

(Photo credit: Alvimann from morguefile.com)

internet entrepreneur, leverage social media, online success, search engine optimization, SEO writing

July 20th, 2011 by Dana Prince

If you’re in the world of internet business, you know it can have ups and downs and can go from feast to famine to feast again.  When you’re in a bit of a famine, it can be jarring; especially if you work full-time on the Internet.

While no business is typically recession proof, here are some ways that you can protect yourself and some tips about how to align your eggs so that:

a) you’re prepared for growth

b) you can survive a slow period

c) you use down time constructively

Diversify Online Business

Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Even if you’re meeting your nut every month with selling one affiliate product or through your own product creation sales, make sure you have more than one stream of income.  If an internet marketing program should get cancelled or sales suddenly plummet you want to have a backup plan and you don’t want to be crippled financially because you’ve lost your only source of online income. Make sure that if your largest income source disappeared tomorrow you’d be okay.

Portion Your Income Wisely

Business owners should pay themselves and pay their business so be sure you use a portion of your profits for future business development as well as sock away a few months worth of living expenses. When money is really good, be sure to save some for a rainy day.

Plan For The Future

Here’s a big one.  When you’re booming and busy it’s easy to stay in the now instead of looking ahead. Always look ahead even if things are good. When you have a bit of down time, use it to grow your business. Read up on SEO and social marketing and follow some gurus who give great advice. Keep doing article writing even if you like the search engine results you have. You need to work persistently at your site’s SEO. Don’t ever become complacent with whatever spot you’ve got in the search engines because you’ll suddenly be dethroned one day and you won’t know what hit you. SEO isn’t evergreen so you need to work at it constantly.  When you feel a lull in your business volume, work at it some more.  How do you do that?

SEO Isn’t Evergreen!

-Add a blog to your site. I know a skilled ghostblogger (wink) who can help you keep traffic coming to your site and get you new customers.

-Article marketing.  Add articles to article directories that point to your site. It’ll bring you people and visitors.  (I offer a great article directory SEO package. Ask me about it)

-Social media. Step up your social media efforts to network with more people, get more customers and get the skinny on the latest and greatest goings on in your niche.

This business does  have peaks and valleys but even in a recession, you can weather the storm. If you’re constantly growing your knowledge and investing in your business you’ll ride the wave and be ok!

diverse income, internet business, online income, recession proof

June 18th, 2011 by Dana Prince

If you want a successful website, you’ll need to do some online marketing. Some internet marketing techniques are expensive, some are low cost, and some are even free.  How much should you spend on your marketing?

Even if your marketing budget is low, a good combo of sweat equity and sound financial investments together can help you make your site successful with minimal financial risk. As your site starts to achieve some success and you reap some harvests, make sure to plant some seeds for future growth as well as to try out new online marketing methods.

A good approach is to start off small. Do a mixture of free and low cost marketing methods. As you start to make profits, invest some of those profits into growth for your site.  Research some marketing options that guarantee that they will provide some good return on investment. Set some goals and milestones and as you achieve them, make sure you take some of your profit and invest it further.

There is no rule of thumb about how much money it will cost you to create a successful website but here are some ideas to start off small and then grow, step by step:

When you create your business website, start off with a low cost site. Invest in it as it starts to make money. You’ll find low cost web hosting options with free templates you can use to build a website and / or a business blog. If you’re not at all comfortable with designing your own site, look for a well-reviewed web designer and ask for an introductory package. Experienced web designers can build something basic to get you started for a small investment.

As you begin to make money,consider investing in some professional design elements, a premium theme, and / or some help writing professional content and optimizing for search engines. The key is to take a step at a time that involves research, implementation, and analytics.

Low Cost Marketing

Want to market without spending a fortune? Free and low cost marketing options could include free services for press releases, article submissions, and free social media tools. As you start to see some success from low cost and free methods, consider researching and investing in a few paid advertising programs and premium services that can help you get more sales and more website traffic.

In terms of advertising, as you grow you’ll see more opportunities. Assign a budget from your profits to help you fuel future growth and analyze each method you use so you’ll know which ones are worth spending more time or money on.

Tip:

Not every marketing method will pay off immediately. And some won’t pay off at all. Carefully analyze your website traffic on a monthly basis so you can ascertain where traffic comes from and which of your free, low cost, and heftier priced investments are providing good ROI.

It takes time for marketing to pay off. But the great thing about marketing online is that you can continually analyze your efforts to determine which ones are working well. And, a lot of paid online marketing methods are guaranteed so it’s often a good idea to risk an investment as the financial risk could be minimal.

Low Cost Marketing Ideas:

Here are some low cost ideas that could pack a big punch:

Website Creation: Try Hostgator. It’s low cost for startup as well as for hosting fees and there are a lot of free templates offered as well as free add-ons via CPanel.

Content Creation: Hiring a web content writer to help you with your messaging, social media, blogging, and online marketing can help you quickly achieve organic traffic and increase your chance of converting a website visitor into a customer. There are cheap, affordable, and premium priced web content writers out thee. The cheapest isn’t necessarily the best but neither is the most expensive. Look for a writer whose style appeals to your audience and who’s reputation is a solid.

Read! Read up on online marketing methods and try to get in tune with what your target audience wants. The web has an almost unlimited amount of resources available. Not all of them are altruistic but you can gather a lot of free marketing information that can help you launch a successful business or turn a flat lining website into something that starts to develop a strong pulse!

low cost marketing, marketing methods, online marketing, web content writer