Smartphone App For Your Small Business

Posted on by April 30, 2013

4-13-smartphone-apps-for-your-small-bizHow do you decide whether or not to develop a mobile app for your business?

Mobile site or mobile app? Thats the real question. Do you require one or the other, or both? Understanding your businesses’ needs goes a long way toward helping you decide if you should invest the time and money necessary to develop and put into play a mobile app for your business. Does a mobile app make sense for your company? What are the costs, both in developing one and in maintaining one? Have you got someone capable of updating it? You need the answers to these and several other questions in order to really come up with a wise decision. Let’s take a peek at a few of the pros and cons. read more

Green Marketing

Posted on by April 25, 2013

4-13-green-marketing-ideasPaint your business green!

Earth day is upon us again, and it’s a great time to think about how Green Marketing can be a useful way to appeal to environmentally conscious consumers. This is not just a smart way to conserve our precious natural resources, but it has developed into a hot political and social topic in our communities. The most obvious reason to embrace Green marketing would be to manage our available resources with an eye toward good stewardship. Nonetheless, you would be smart to keep your business’s public image in mind simultaneously, because the image it projects is often a deciding factor for many people nowadays. Many will opt for an eco-friendly choice over another company that doesn’t exercise Green marketing on principle alone. read more

Vanilla Blueberry Scones

Posted on by April 24, 2013

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I love these scones. I learned to love to bake and cook from my grandma, and this post is especially for her. But wouldn’t these Vanilla Blueberry Scones also make a lovely mother’s day gift? {Mother’s Day is coming fast: it’s May 12, 2013}

Learn how to make these scones, and get the full recipe here.

Enjoy!

SMBs – Smitten with Content Marketing (for good reason..)

Posted on by April 23, 2013

4-13-content-marketing-to-boost-salesContent Marketing: What It Is and Why You Need It!

Content marketing might be a term you’ve heard tossed about lately, but still may not know exactly what it means for your small business. To put it simply, content marketing is the practice of creating, collecting, and making available fresh content for one’s readers. This may come in various forms, including blog posts, articles, whitepapers, short reports, videos, podcasts, ebooks, social media and more. We live in an age that treasures information, and the more you can present your readers with the greater authority you will hold in their eyes, which can often bring about better rankings, increased traffic, links, and sales. read more

5 Tips for Good-Looking Mobile Emails

Posted on by April 18, 2013

4-13-five-tips-for-good-looking-mobile-emailsDoes Your Email Look Grim on Mobile Devices?

It’s tough enough to make sure your email marketing messages get through without making the task more onerous. Making certain you are optimizing your marketing emails could be the difference in success or failure in your campaigns, particularly as mobile email open rates are increasing rapidly.

Mobile email opens are exploding!

Mobile email is now the most opened email, surpassing desktop with a robust 36 percent, according to Knotice.com. Combine that with the reality that email is the preferred online communication mode of 74 percent of all adults, and you will see why it’s so important. It’s not just phones either. Tablets are starting to take a major share also, as ReturnPath reports that iPhones account for 59 percent, iPads 26 percent, Androids 14 percent and Windows phones bringing up the rear at less than 1 percent. read more

Homepage Sins: 15 Ways to Improve Your Homepage

Posted on by April 16, 2013

4-13-fifteen-ways-to-improve-website15 homepage sins that are costing you sales

Sometimes it’s about what you don’t do as much as it is what you do. This can ring extremely true on the subject of your website. There are lots of things that can send visitors screaming into cyberspace to escape these grievous issues. Let‘s find out if some of these sound familiar to you.

  • No clear objective – According to DinkumInteractive.com you have about 4 seconds to convey what your website is about before they leave.
  • Your content isn’t scannable – Web viewers read in chunks, and if they can’t scan your page and get it in a few seconds, you’ve probably lost them!
  • Not being mobile ready – Mobile is no longer an extravagance, as according to Google half of all website traffic is mobile.
  • Not making use of video on your site – Videos rule, but whatever you decide to do, avoid autoplaying music at all costs!
  • No updated, quality content – If your content is from Bush’s first term, it’s no surprise they’re fleeing! Also no fancy fonts or extremely long pages.
  • No contact information – You want to ensure your customers can contact you when they want to!
  • Not collecting email addresses – Also a necessity. Developing a list is one of the keys to long-term success online.
  • Not utilizing Meta tags on your website – Especially the title and description tags. These can help you to get indexed and ranked in the search engines.
  • Lack of social sharing buttons – Like it or not, making your site be shareable on social sites is where the party is, so get over it!
  • No or poor Calls-to-Action – You want an action from your visitors; ask for it!
  • No clear site navigation – Don’t use drop down menus, and make sure every page on your website contains a link back to the home page.
  • Not optimizing your images – Make sure to use the ALT and TITLE tags for any images or videos you are using.
  • Overuse of Flash – Besides being a pain for the GoogleBot to read, it may be very irritating to your visitors.
  • No metrics to determine your progress – Do you actually not want to learn the quantity of people are coming around and from where? What do they like, or not like?
  • “Intro” pages – These are merely an obstacle to your content. You really want to go there? (I’m looking at you, fancy restaurants.)
    • read more

    Get More Client Referrals

    Posted on by April 9, 2013

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    7 top techniques for getting more client referrals

    Most small businesses are always looking for ways to obtain more client referrals. However as outlined by GrowThink.com some 58.6% of us don’t even bother to ask for them! This isn’t something that takes place automagically, but rather is the offspring of a clear, focused strategy applied persistently. So that you can catch the idea allow me to share seven easy ways to get more client referrals, faster and easier than you may have thought possible! read more

    Surveying your Clients

    Posted on by April 4, 2013

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    If You’re Not Surveying Customers, You’re Cruisin’ for a Bruisin’

    Do you truly know how well you’re doing with your clients and customers? Are there problem areas or holes in your customer service you’re unaware of? Would you like to find out what they really think? There’s only one way to get this information—ask them! A well-crafted customer survey can be a useful tool that will help you discover the answers to these and many other items you may not even have known were issues for your customers. read more

    Online Reputation Management Strategies

    Posted on by April 2, 2013

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    Use these 5 Online Reputation Strategies to Manage your Company’s Brand

    You might think that online reputation management isn’t something you ought concern yourself with. I would implore you to reconsider that thought!

    According to eMarketer 83% of consumers declare that online reviews sway their opinions about a particular company, and 8 of 10 of these people added that a negative entry online is the cause of them changing their mind regarding that company. Even one negative review, justified or not, can negate all of your finest efforts if you haven’t planned an online reputation strategy to manage it. So to help out with that I’d like to present five strategies your business, and your brand, can implement to monitor and manage your online reputation. read more

    How to Connect With Buyers Using Google+ Local

    Posted on by March 28, 2013

    3-13-google-local-logoHow to Use Google+ Local to Connect with Buyers

    Even though it’s been a few months since Google merged with Google Places to become Google Local, there was some confusion as to just what this new entity would grow to be. No longer. One shining illustration of what is possible for small business is the Google business page for BakeSpace.com. They have employed all of the features such as hangouts, video and more to garner more than 330,000 users inside their circles. Businesses are waking up to the enormous opportunity that lies within Google Local and are finding excellent ways to use it for finding buyers and prospects. read more