If you have a brick and mortar store, and rely on walk-in traffic for your survival, you may be wondering what the Internet can do for your business. Believe it or not, a lot – and you don’t even need a website.

In the “old days”, the bulk of businesses relied on the Yellow Pages to get the phone ringing. The majority of marketing dollars were spent getting listed in this ten pound paperweight. With the popularity of the Net, less people let “their fingers do the walking” when they need something, and more are letting their mouse do the talking.

Online search has gone mainstream when it comes to searching for local businesses. Google states that 73% of searches are done for local content. Another study by BIA/Kelsey and Constat report that 97% of consumers use online resources when doing research for products/services in their local area. See www.kelseygroup.com/press/pr100310.asp.

Google has always understood the power of local search, and years ago launched its Local Business Center where any business can get a listing for free. Recently, they’ve done a major overhaul and have re-launched with a new name of “Google Places”, showcasing a host of new features. The name change was done to tie in with Google’s Place Pages which were launched over a year ago and include over 50 million places worldwide. Official Google Blog

If you want customers to be able to find you, and haven’t listed your offline store here yet, you need to get with the program. You are missing out on the chance to reach millions of Google users, including Google Map users, Google’s 800 Voice Directory Search and even Google Earth. And all of this exposure won’t cost you a dime. It’s totally free.

Now that I have your attention, let’s go over the steps for inclusion. As with all things Google, you’ll need to sign into Google Places with your Google Account. Up to 100 single locations can be added but, if you have more than ten to list you’ll need to use their “Bulk Upload Tool”.

There is a verification process that must be done to prove you’re the owner of the business being listed. The choice is yours, it’s by phone or mail. Once this is done, your listing goes live.

Now in case you’re thinking all that’s included in a listing is an address and phone number, hold onto your hat. Here are some of the listing options.

1) Show the geographic area you service.

2) Photos: Upload yours, up to ten images per listing, in JPG, GIF, PNG, TIFF, BMP. A professional photo shoot can also be requested for your business.

3) Place Page Posts: You can post real time updates here, up to 160 characters, announcing special sales, events, and new products. One post appears at a time.

4) Custom QR Codes: For use with smart phones to take users to your mobile website.

5) Advertise: They do have a “Tags Program” in select cities for $25.00 a month where your business will be highlighted on Google.com and Google Maps.

6) List your operating hours. Biz description and even reviews.

7) Post Videos: Up to five videos can be posted, but you’ll need to publish them to YouTube first, then include the URL’s on your Place Page.

Payment Types Taken

9) Coupons: Create online coupons to give people incentive to visit your site. There’s a separate “coupon tab” that appears on your listing page.

10) Privacy: If you work at homë and have no storefront you can choose to make your address private in your listing.

At this point you should be realizing how important being listed in Google Places is to your business. If you’d like to see what your listing looks like to a searcher, log into Google Places and click on “see your listing on Google Maps”.

Now remember, search results are based on relevance and “geographic distance”, so you can’t buy your way to the top of the list as with pay-per-click advertising. As previously mentioned, the “tags program”, if available in your area, can be utilized for having your business show up highlighted for $25.00 a month.

If you’re interested in paying for your links to show up on the Google Maps search results page, if related to the search terms and location searched, that can be done using Google’s Adwords program with what’s called “Local Targeted Ads”.

By the way, Google also includes a “Reporting Dashboard” that will tell you how people find you, and what keywords they used to search. It’s powerful stuff that can also be used in your local search engine optimization work.

Do yourself a favor – if you’re not listed with “Google Places”, now is a good time. It’s targeted, free traffic. Now where else can you say that when it comes to marketing on the Internet. People are looking for your business online and with Google Places you can make it easier for them to find you. Website or not – it simply doesn’t matter – but getting people in the door does, and Google is there to help.

For the past several years as I have built my business, I’ve made sure to surround myself with people who help both my business and myself grow. Whether this is a mastermind, a mentor or a coach, these people propel me forward in a way that I doubt I could do as easily on my own.

Building a business isn’t easy, but you don’t have to do it alone. Here are four ways I’ve benefited (and continue to benefit) from having someone like this in my corner.

Shortcuts

I have always been a big believer in not reinventing the wheel. Often we think we need to figure everything out on our own, the hard way-and that this is just a part of the journey towards success.

But why build from scratch or one slow step at a time when you can learn from someone who has already done what you are trying to achieve? You can still make progress in an authentic and personalized way by modeling others and putting your own unique spin on it.

This way, you not only save time, but also frustration by avoiding the mistakes that others have made and are now able to caution you on.

Accountability

This is something that we all could use more of in our businesses and our lives. Sure, we could set goals and then pledge to keep ourselves on track, but once we know someone else is going to be keeping on top of us, we often experience a whole new level of motivation and desire for accomplishment.

This can be the key to more implementing-and less procrastinating.

Thinking Bigger

To really achieve more, sometimes we just have to get out of our own head-and our own way. A mentor or a coach can give that outside perspective and be your biggest fan, encouraging you to make those big jumps you otherwise might be too afraid to make on your own.

Personally, this has been one of the most incredibly transformational results I have gotten out my own experience with a coach.

I heard the phrase “don’t ladder-climb, leap” recently and this is exactly how I see certain decisions in my business now. It’s very freeing when you give yourself permission to move forward this way-even when others might think you’ve gone off the deep end!

Setting Boundaries

Putting parameters around certain things in your business-whether it be time spent with clients, what your responsibility will be in a partnership, or just simply what you will tolerate day to day can be something business owners often fail to do.

Unfortunately, this lack of boundary setting can lead to resentful feelings towards yourself and others. You might instinctively know that you need to get clear on what your boundaries are, but we often need to hear it from somebody else before we really begin sticking to them.

The best mentors won’t be afraid to tell you in what areas you might not be doing this so well-and hold you to a plan in order to enforce it and make it a habit.

As you can see, seeking out this kind of support isn’t just a way to get a little bit of cheerleading here and there-it’s a smart strategy that will help elevate your business in multiple ways and accelerate your success.

I get many questions about my job as a copywriter and SEO practitioner, and for the most part they follow a similar theme- ‘what do you do?’ and ‘could I do it?’ In an attempt to address these questions once and for all and possibly also give an insight into the life of an internet marketer I’ve put together an article: this article.

A large portion of my day is spent writing. From articles to press releases, website content to blogs: countless hours are spent staring at a blank page, frantically scrambling for inspiration or that perfectly sculpted sentence. The phrase ‘writer’s block’ is an often derided cliche, but there is no denying that sometimes you just can’t quite work out exactly what you’re trying to say, or even more infuriatingly, the best way to say it. Some will go for a walk to clear their mind, others to their cigarette packet or porcelain throne in an attempt to find clarity.

In the realm of content writing and SEO based copywriting in general there is a very simple reason why these personal catalysts are turned to with persistent regularity: it can be boring. There, I said it and to emphasise my conviction will say it again: Writing For Seo Purposes Can Be Boring. Now hopefully you’ll grant me enough time to justify this outburst before reporting me to the various authorities, oh, and please forgive my reliance on personal experience in portraying a more universal point.

I go into work every day knowing that I am required to write intelligently and enthusiastically on topics which I may have very limited previous knowledge of, and due to what I assume to be some sort of genetic defect: utterly love it. It is my love of writing that stops me from finding it boring. I am fully aware that the majority of people wouldn’t revel in this challenge, which is great for me as it reduces my competition. Consequently, the odds are that you’re reading this purely to find out a little more about writing on just one broad topic: and to make another assumption, I expect that your writing on this topic is to promote your website. It is to you non-reveller, single broad topic focussed, committed website owner that I level my ‘it can be boring’ battle-cry as an explanation for your writer’s block and seek to show how you can get round it.

You have passion for your chosen topic, well, I sincerely hope you do (if you aren’t enthusiastic about your product/website/company/field of operation then it won’t be poorly written content that jeopardizes your company’s longevity and more importantly in this instance: my whole argument rests on it). It is this passion and the resulting knowledge you have amassed on the subject that is key to your success in writing copy, articles and press releases for your website. No amount of literary flair, cunning word play or EXCESSIVE USE OF formatting Tools is ever going to appeal to your target reader more than the sound advice and authoritative content that you, the expert on this subject are capable of providing. Equally important is the very fact that if you’re passionate about something then surely you aren’t going to find it boring.

Having established that you are more than qualified to advise others on your chosen subject and have enough interest in it to apply yourself to the time consuming task of writing accurately about it, all I can really do is give you a few pointers and tips on converting your knowledge into something which others can benefit from and in doing so raise the profile and credibility of your website. To avoid taking up too much of your time, I’ll keep it brief:

1. Provide Original Content

Whether you’re writing the content for your homepage or an article explaining the finer points of your industry and associated benefits, you must ensure that what you’re saying isn’t said elsewhere. Inevitably there will be others who have said something vaguely similar, but focus upon being better and different. You will get no credít from search engines for duplicating someone else’s work and gain no customers by rehashing a competitor’s article.

2. Research Tone and Style

We all write differently depending on the context. A blog on celebrity gossip will read very differently to a governmental department’s homepage and the way you construct a text message to a friend will differ to the structure of an email you send to a business associate. It’s well worth researching the homepage content of similar websites when writing yours in order to judge which style you find most effective, relevant and credible. It is more than likely that the style you find most suitable will be the style your prospective visitors will find most suitable: so copy it (NOT THE CONTENT…just the tone and style). Once you’ve established this starting point then write in a way you find comfortable but adhering loosely to the tone you’ve chosen to emulate. The words should come naturally, don’t worry if it doesn’t sound quite right you can always come back and edit the text.

3. Double Check Grammar and Spelling

Having spent hours crafting your text, there is nothing more irritating than publishing the piece to discover an abundance of easily avoided errors. Get others to read your copy with a critical eye before making it live, they may well spot something you’ve missed. Having taken onboard any amendments: read it again…and again before committing it to the archives of internet history.

4. Enjoy It

I know, I know…easier said than done, but if you care about the subject matter and the benefits the content will have for your business then I’m sure you won’t find it that hard.

This post was supposed to be brief but I got a little carried away, I just hope it provided a little guidance to those hovering on the precipice of a first foray into writing online content. If you republish this, then please include the resource box- a vast number of my more conventional and less formal articles have been ‘stolen’ in the past and put on websites in the guise of original content.

Google is starting to make some significant moves that may give Google Buzz a significant boost. For example, this week, a “Reshare” button was announced. This is essentially Google’s version of the retweet. If you follow a Buzz user who posts an interesting update, you can hit the “reshare” button (down with the comment, like, and email buttons) to repost that post to your own Buzz stream. Reshare only works for public posts. Private posts will not have the reshare link. However, you can reshare posts yourself publicly or privately. If a lot of people you follow reshare the same post, the similar posts will be collapsed.

“You’ll notice that resharing creates a new post, effectively forking the conversation. To fork or not fork was a decision we debated for a while,” says Buzz software engineer Sam Goto. “Ultimately, we think forked conversations help create more varied, intimate discussions around a single item. We realize people may want a non-forking version too, so we’re thinking about how to do that as well.”

“When there is a chain of reshares, the names of all of the people who publicly reshare the post appear on the original item, even if they’re not directly connected to the original author,” Goto explains. “If you share something that ends up getting passed around by lots of other people, it’s pretty cool to see that.”

It’s also worth noting that you can “like” a reshare, and that will not translate to a “like” for the original post. This means you can like a comment without liking what the comment is about.

Google also announced that it’s releasing an XHTML version of the Buzz website which can be accessed from many mobile devices like those running Android pre-2.0, Blackberry, Nokia S60, and Windows Mobile. This could go a long way for getting Buzz used by mobile users across a broader range of devices.

Google Buzz launched earlier this year to a great deal of hype – and why not – a potential Facebook/Twitter competitor from the giant that is Google – but much of the “buzz” about Buzz has faded in the months since. In fact, most of the discussion in the media about Buzz has been centered around privacy issues (though that has become considerably less rampant…Facebook has filled that role nicely).

As we’ve been saying since long before Buzz was announced, the key to a Google social network offering is in the integration with its other products. This made launching Buzz within Gmail seem like a smart move, but there is still much work to be done if Buzz is to become a real player in the space.

Adding features, such as the reshare feature is a start, but what may have a more significant impact was an announcement that came last week.

During Google I/O, I attended a session in which Google quietly announced the launch of the Buzz API. The news was generally overshadowed by other Google announcements, such as the unveilings of Google TV and FroYo, but with developers getting access to the Buzz API, there is room for much to be done around the service in terms of third-party apps, which should ultimately make Buzz much more useful. That’s what happened with Twitter. Developers like TweetDeck, Boxee, Buzzzy, Klout, Meebo, Seesmic, Vinehub, Shareaholic, and other have already taken advantage of the Buzz API.

It’s hard to say if the general public will find a real need for Buzz alongside Facebook, Twitter and other services, but as Google grows its presence in mobile via Android, and soon into television via Google TV, there will be more potential gateways for Buzz adoption, as well as integration.

High rankings in Google search results are coveted by nearly all webmasters, but Google is constantly making changes to keep them on their toes. Actually, Google is said to make roughly one change per day.

One recent change in particular, however, has gotten some webmasters riled up. It’s being referred to as “Mayday,” and some claim it is costing them money.

Ex-Googler Vanessa Fox, who spoke on a panel with current Googler Matt Cutts at Google I/O last week, quotes Cutts as saying, “this is an algorithmic change in Google, looking for higher quality sites to surface for long tail queries. It went through vigorous testing and isn’t going to be rolled back.”

She also says Google told her that it was a rankings change, as opposed to a crawling/indexing change. This, she says, “seems to imply that sites getting less traffic still have their pages indexed, but some of those pages are no longer ranking as highly as before.”

“This change seems to have primarily impacted very large sites with ‘item’ pages that don’t have many individual links into them, might be several clicks from the home page, and may not have substantial unique and value-added content on them,” says Fox. “For instance, ecommerce sites often have this structure. The individual product pages are unlikely to attract external links and the majority of the content may be imported from a manufacturer database. Of course, as with any change that results in a traffic hit for some sites, other sites experience the opposite.”

She has more to say about it at Search Engine Land, offering some of her own speculation. One reader accuses the change of delivering “a real blow” to his revenue.

This is not the first we’ve heard about “Mayday”. There’s been discussion about it around the SEO community all month, but this is the first we’ve seen it really addressed by Google.

Most savvy webmasters have learned by now that they can’t rely on Google rankings alone to drive traffic. This is why social media opportunities presented by networks like Facebook and Twitter have become so attractive. The way people search and obtain information is becoming more and more diversified, not only spread out around different applications (largely due to increased mobile usage), but also within search engines themselves.

For example, Google recently rolled out its big SERP redesign, which gives users a great deal more options for filtering their results (or at least puts these options in the spotlight). The importance of ranking in a completely natural, organic search has become greatly diluted over time. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still nice, but it’s getting harder to rely on as well as less critical for discovery.

Blogging, tweeting, friending. Odd sounding verbs, these. Not sure you’ll find them in the “verb” category in the dictionary ~ at least not yet. Give them time. “Ain’t” made it in, and that verb didn’t have nearly the grassroots support of these three.

Indeed, this triad of “new verbs” are both the result and the harbinger of the most prominent types of social networks and Social Media Marketing in the world today: personal and professional blogs (with RSS feeds so you can stay “tuned in”), Twitter (the “mini-blog” suited to the info-bites attitude and fast-forward pace of our lives in the 21st century), and Facebook (the global water-cooler). As the Bible says of Faith, Hope, and Love, these three remain. Blogging, Twitter, and Facebook: which is “the greatest of these” remains to be seen.

In the realm of the online marketplace, however, it’s no contest. The wínner is: all three of them. They are the leaders of the newest form of network marketing and one of the most effective: Social Media Marketing.

Why is it so effective? Three reasons that are particularly attractive to small business and other entrepreneurs: low impact/annoyance factor, cost effectiveness, and a viral spread of information.

1. Low Impact (and therefore low annoyance factor) :-

In the same way that email rapidly replaced telephone contact and so called “face time,” blogging, Twitter, and Facebook are replacing other more traditional forms of marketing, and for the same reasons.

Emailing became the norm for the “sender” of information because it was easier (both physically and emotionally) than making a phone call or meeting with someone in person. Email grants immediate completion and instant gratification: No getting a busy signal or, worse, an answering machine or voice mail inbox that required you to leave a message (wherein you might say the wrong thing and not be able to erase and re-record) and no having to carry on an unscripted conversation with someone in person (wherein the same dangers were ever present). The receiver was equally blessed by the ability to respond (or not) at his or her leisure and with the same assurance of faux pas-free “conversation.”

Social Media does the same for marketing by freeing the marketer to place his or her “ads” at any time, around the clock, 24/7, rather than to some PR office or publisher’s schedule, while simultaneously granting the target audience the ability read/view and/or delete at will instead of having to dispose of or recycle the publication, and all for the low, low price of . . . well, nothing.

Which naturally leads us to reason number 2.

2. Cost Effective (’cause it’s free!) :-

Well the section header pretty much says it all. You can’t get much more cost effective than “free,” and all of these Social Media Marketing venues are just that. Free as the air you breathe ~ which, by the way, is how many viruses spread.

3. Wherein a Virus can be Your Business’s Best Friend :-

Remember the “water-cooler” metaphor above? Years ago, in the traditional brick and mortar model of business, the water-cooler was the place where employees would gather to socialize during breaks, exchanging pleasantries and information, introducing the “new guy” to the old guard, telling jokes and showing off pictures of their pets or the new baby.

Long after the physical water-cooler had been replaced by bottled water, “hanging around the water-cooler” remained a metaphor for the casual meetings and conversations that took place among people in the physical spaces of a business environment. Whatever the place, the close physical proximity inherent to “hanging around the water-cooler,” made it equally easy to pass along a cold or flu bug with the jokes and those pictures of your little ones.

As it is in the physical world, so is it in the virtual, and it is in this way, especially, that Social Media Marketing is effective. Facebook is an especially good example of the virtual “water-cooler” inasmuch as people “meet” there and exchange information (including jokes and pictures of the fam) and provide the perfect growth environment for spreading a “virus” in the form of word-of-mouth marketing.

It’s little wonder, then, that adopting Social Media Marketing is a good idea for your small business. And it’s kind of comforting to some of us, after all, that even here, in the virtual business world, we can find in these new fangled technologies an echo of tradition and a sense of continuity that is familiar and reassuring.

As the number of websites grow everyday, it is becoming increasingly difficult for a new site to attain good rankings on search engines. Since major search engines factor link popularity heavily into their ranking algorithms, building relevant links to your site is perhaps the single most important component of search engine optimization.

For a new site with no, or few inbound links, buying text links on more established related sites could provide a boost to your link popularity. But this strategy could prove prohibitively expensive, especially in a highly competitive market where you’d have to buy lots of links to catch up with the competition.

Web directory listings represent a viable alternative to link buying. Apart from driving traffic to your site through direct referrals, web directories provide one-way inbound links to your site, boosting your link popularity and ultimately improving your search rankings.

There are thousands of web directories on the net, with dozens sprouting up every day. Some are general directories; others cater to specific niches. Some are free; others charge inclusion fees. Some are free only if you provide a reciprocal link in return. Many feature both free and paid listings.

The main advantage of a paid listing is the luxury of having your site listed quickly above everybody else’s. Free submissions may take several weeks or months for review. If you work on a limited budget, you may want to submit to a handful of paid directories and a few hundred free ones.

Some directories charge inclusion fees that are too high for the listing to be cost effective. When considering a paid listing, look at not only the Google PageRank of the homepage of the directory, but also that of the subpage where your link will actually reside. While it may seem like a good deal to have your site listed on a PR5 directory for $15, the deal becomes far less attractive when you find out that the internal page where your link is placed is only PR2.

If you’ve ever submítted to web directories before, I don’t have to convince you that the process is extremely tedious and time-consuming, especially when you submit to a large number of them. Unlike search engines that send out robots to index web pages, web directories rely on more detailed submission forms to gather information about your site. Since each submitted site must be reviewed by a real person, most directories require that submissions are also performed by a real person, as opposed to an automatic script. Many directories use a visual code verification process to prevent automated submissions. Apart from complying with the directory’s guidelines, manual submission is the only way to ensure that your site is submitted to the proper category.

Because of the time involved in manually submitting your site and the sheer number of directories on the web, it’s important that you know which directories to submit to. Obviously, you’d want to submit to only the high-PR directories and avoid the low-PR ones, right? Not really. Just because a directory has a low PR does not mean that it’s not worth submitting to. The directory may be brand new and not around long enough to be ranked by Google. In contrast to the more established directories that continually experience a back-log of submissions, newer directories tend to review and list sites more quickly. As the directory becomes more popular, so will your link. So, don’t judge a directory solely by its PageRank; rather, base your decision on the overall quality of the directory.

Another important thing to look at is whether or not the directory you submit to is search engine friendly. Search engines like static web pages whose content stay the same regardless of who visits the page, or when they visit, not dynamic pages that are created on-the-fly. Browse to a couple of categories and look at the URL in the navigation bar. If the URL looks like, http://www.anysite.com/forums/thread.php?threadid=12345&sort=date, it’s probably not search engine friendly. An example of a static, search engine friendly URL is: http://www.anysite.com .

Another question to ask is: How easy is it to submit to the directory? How many hoops do you have to jump through to get to the submission form? When you finally get to the form, how many fields does the form have? A directory should ask for pertinent information like your name, email, URL, link title, link description, and keywords, but it should not look like a job application. With the exception of a handful of major directories like DMOZ and Yahoo, you should not have to spend more than 3 to 4 minutes to submit your site.

Another consideration is whether or not the directory has a category specific enough for your site. For optimal SEO benefits from your listing, your link should be grouped under a specific category containing sites whose content are related to yours. Such a grouping makes your listíng more relevant in the eyes of the search engines, as well as providing an easier way for visitors to the directory to find your site.

Simply having your site listed on a directory is not enough. Your choice of the link title can determine how much impact your listing will have on your search engine rankings. Ideally, your link title (or “anchor text”) should contain the keywords that you want others to search for to get to your site. Since most web directories require a unique link title, however, it may not be possible to select a common phrase like “Free Web Directory” as your link title. This title is likely already taken by another web directory. Simply prefixing the phrase with your domain name, e.g. “GoDirectory.org Free Web Directory”, would make the title unique.

Oftentimes, a directory has several related categories that are suitable for your site. How do you decide which one to submit to? Ideally, you’d want to submit to the category that has the highest PageRank. However, this may not turn out to be the wisest choice as your link may be buried among a zillion other listings. Going with a lower-PR category with fewer competing links may prove to be more beneficial. When choosing from multiple related categories, choose one with a good balance of relevancy, Pagerank, and number of competing listings.

In sum, submitting to web directories is a highly effective link building strategy that should be an integral part of any search engine optimization campaign. Manually submitting to a large number of directories is both laborious and time-consuming. Just keep the above points in mind to make the most of your time.

Keyword development is the foundation of any online business or organization that strives to establish and maintain a reasonably high internet presence. Quite literally the only way to be found online is through the web searches people conduct.

Keyword popularity, use and relevancy are what eventually lead people to any site or content. The selection and placement of the correct words within these sites or content is therefore vital in order to appear in any search results.

Obviously the development of an effective keyword list is critical in order for a site owner or content developer to maintain a noticeable profile online.

Here are 5 important components that are involved in the development of an effective keyword list.

Research Tool

The first step in developing a keyword list is to research those words or phrases that are the most relevant for your purposes. It is usually a good idea to brainstorm a list of words through your own ideas and that of others to start out.

Taking the ideas you have compiled it is recommended you then plug them into a keyword research tool. Such a tool will offer you further suggestions of applicable words and phrases you can use. The use of this tool will be invaluable to you whenever you are putting together or updating a list of keywords.

Keyword Specific

As you ‘fine tune’ your list what you want to do is to develop phrases that are much more specified than the generalities associated with using just one or two words.

For instance car dealerships can be pretty general since it does not specify a location or the type cars the dealership has in stock. When you ‘target’ BMW dealerships in Chicago you have now better defined your target audience. Any web searches will now send traffic of only those people with an interest in the particular make of vehicle in the location that is specified.

Search Result

The list you compile should be done so with a consideration towards their popularity. The words or phrases you select should reflect a healthy amount of searches being conducted on them.

Here again your keyword research tool will serve you well in supplying both monthly and annual estimates on the number of searches done on selected words or phrases.

Relevancy

Always use only words that are relevant to what it is you are representing. To do otherwise will only be a waste of time and effort for both you and the people who search on these words.

Content Development

The need for a keyword list is because you want to optimize any content you may be using online for better exposure. What you will want your properly optimized content to do is serve a useful purpose for the people who find it.

Since this will be your ‘initial’ contact with these people you will want this same content to serve as an ‘introduction’ of sorts to what it is you are representing. Ultimately if what you have composed consists of quality information people will want to also link to it for future reference.

Keyword development is an ongoing and vital necessity of any business or organization that needs to maintain a strong online presence. The primary means in which to be found or discovered on the internet is through web searches people conduct.

Keyword popularity, relevancy and use are 3 factors that lead people to the content or sites that they are seeking. For anyone wanting to be easily found online therefore the proper development of an effective keyword list that can be used within their content is an absolute must.

The 5 components reviewed above make up the entire process of researching and developing an optimal list of words needed to maintain a reasonably high online profile.

Author: TJ Philpott

No matter how good your company is, some people will always write something negative about your site, even if you tried your best to help them.

Some customers might write negative comments about your company in their blogs or some of your competitors might like to damage your reputation by creating fake comments about your site.

What can you do if web pages with negative comments appear on Google’s first result page for your company name?

1. Fix the problem

If people write negative reviews about your company, the first thing that you should do is to fix the problem that caused the negative review.

2. It doesn’t hurt to ask

Send the webmaster of the web page with the negative review a polite email and ask for removal of the negative comments. Many webmasters will cooperate if you explain the issue.

3. Give web pages with positive comments a boost

If the webmaster does not want to remove the negative review, find websites that contain positive comments about your site.

Link to these pages from your own website to increase the link popularity of these pages. The more links the pages with the positive reviews have, the higher they will be ranking in the search results.

If appropriate, bookmark web pages with positive remarks about your website on social bookmark sites such as Digg and Delicious.

4. Ask for testimonials from happy customers

If you receive positive feedback from customers, ask them to write a review on ConsumerReview.com, Epinions.com or similar sites.

5. Add your website to company wiki pages

Websites like AboutUs.org allow you to create an article about your company. If your company is important enough, you might even create an entry in Wikipedia.

These Wiki pages will also appear in the search results when someone searches for your company name.

6. Make sure that your own website tops the search results

If your own website comes first for your company name then most people will click on your link and don’t look further. Use IBP to make sure that your own web site has position 1 in the search engine results.

Removing negative comments from the search engine results can take some time. It’s best to avoid negative experiences at the outset by providing high quality products and good customer support.

Twitter has certainly emerged as one of the most popular social networking/blogging platforms of the past few years. There are various reasons why Twitter has become so wildly popular. It is a simple concept where brief messages can be sent to loyal followers. This is why Twitter is so helpful to small businesses. It can aid in promoting a business in the most cost effective manner. Really, this is one of the very best systems for promoting updates, info, and deals to the followers of the Twitter account.

The one problem here is that most entrepreneurs look towards quantity as opposed to quality in their followers. This can prove to be a huge mistake since you don’t ever want to sacrifice quality when looking to amass Twitter followers.

How do people make such a mistake? Well, they look at volume as being the secret to their success. The problem here is that the process is not going to be a very successful one. Rather, it can prove to be disastrous more than anything else because your business ends up promoting itself to those that are really not interested in the products or services you are offering.

Yes, some people will sign on to be followers of your Twitter account with no real interest in being customers. That is why you need to develop a strong niche following as opposed to a large following.

The bottom line here is you do NOT want a large list of followers. You want an EFFECTIVE list of followers.

Some may consider this notion to go against the grain in which a Twitter account should be approached. After all, Twitter is wildly popular so why not follow the trends? The average Twitter account has changed dramatically since July. The number of followers the average account maintains has jumped from 70 to 300. This has led many accounts to boost their number of postings. In July, the number was in the range of 119. Today, it has jumped significantly to 420.

But, is there a great deal of benefit from such increases? In all honesty, if the followers are not going to purchase, the numbers do not really mean much. That means all those increases in updates have less value as well. Again, you want your efforts to be effective. Promoting volume in your approach is not the way to achieve any true level of success.

One problem with a large number of followers is that your tweets need to be adjusted to handle larger volumes. That means your tweets need to be clearly understood by all. As such, you need to promote a generalized approach to the tweets. This is not always the best method because you are not providing detailed and specific information in the tweets. This means those that are serious potential customers may lose interest in the tweets or cease taking them seriously. This is not a good thing if you are seriously trying to sell a product or service.

It becomes a full time job to sort and respond to the real people who are interested in you. Twittering without engagement of your audience defeats the entire process of marketing. I believe many people are using twitter as “lets throw it out there and see what sticks”. I can tell you from testing that this approach does not work. No wonder people are leaving twitter in droves.

This leads to a more potentially serious side effect. If more members of Twitter venture towards promoting generic, uninteresting, and uninspiring tweets so as to boost the volume of people reading, the health of the social network site will not stay strong for long.

Basically, why would anyone would want to follow Twitter when the tweets decline in value? This would certainly not be a positive in terms of the ability for a small business to procure new customers that are vital to the health of the business.

Again, exploring options for expanding a business’ success should center on niche marketing. This approach needs to be taken with Twitter or else the value of Twitter will decline. Based on what we are seeing, the decline will be difficult to avoid in the future based on current actions.

Does this mean that Twitter is decidedly lacking in value for those seeking to utilize what it has to provide? No, no one is making such a statement as it would be a decidedly inaccurate one.

Twitter, in fact, has taken steps to promote niche marketing. This is evident in the ability to devise “Twitter lists.” Twitter lists allow you to take certain members of your massive group of followers and put them in a particular category. You can then promote your tweets to individual members of these various lists. So, you can present wide, generic tweets as well as individualized tweets to those that may be considered more serious potential customers.

For example, you can create a group of people that have already made purchases in the past. Then, you would be free to issue tweets directly to such individuals as you wish. This would be an effective form of niche marketing that would be far more beneficial than putting forth perpetually generalized tweets. One of the other problems with having 1,000′s of non-niched followers is seeing through the noise of twitter.

As such, it is best to look towards growing these individual lists in order to expand the potential to niche market. Yet, many will seek to put forth the exact opposite goal. They will look towards greatly expanding their number of followers into the thousands while not stopping to examine whether or not such a massive list truly boosts their success potential. Such a strategy is a flawed one that will not lead to the empirical success that is sought.

And, if you are not looking to succeed with your business, then why even bother being in business? Twitter has tremendous value and it delivers great benefit to those looking to expand their small business’ promotional strategies in a cost effective manner.

In conclusion, try not to become hung up on the notion of greatly expanding your followers’ list. Seek to promote effective niche marketing strategies instead.

Author: Duncan Wierman