Twenty years on since the internet debut, we have used it extensively for almost any facet of the business and marketing functions, amongst which are direct sales, public relations, customer service, market research etc, all done within the comforts of our own homes.

That said, there is still need to deal with product creation, development and implementation of the marketing plan, albeit a rather different one from your traditional one that you are so used to. In internet marketing, assuming that you are selling online, you require a strong grounding on search engine optimization SEO, monetization methods like affiliate marketing, email marketing and internet advertising as well as traffic driving approaches.

Below are the three key paradoxes of online selling that have both fanned as well as impeded its growth.

First Paradox of Online Selling – Lag in Webpage Loading Time

There is a small paradox which lies in the way of online selling. Understand that the loading of a webpage can make or break a sale. The time taken to load a page can be delayed due to slow network performance and test the patience of user. In fact, many internet marketers have missed many sales in this scenario. The key reason behind this loading delay could be largely due to web design and content. Create a webpage full of graphics will intensify the slow speed of loading.

Second Paradox of Online Selling – Lack Sensory Touch and Taste

When you buy online, you are unable to physically touch and feel the product, taste the freshness nor can you test the authenticity of the product, all factors that are required to make informed decisions. The way to work around these issues is to sell products which do not rely on touch and taste. Many internet marketers also begin to offer good amount of discount to attract online buyers as well as liberal refund system.

Third Paradox of Online Selling – Online Payment Security

Ask any customer what is the key aspect that holds them back from buying online and you will find that it is almost always Online Security. The lack of online security breeds from rampant identity theft, which largely entails theft of credit cards, and other online payment processes. While that was a misnomer on the part of customers, it has taken many years since to reach the level of security that we now enjoy. Many websites engaging in direct sales are well networked with trusted and secured payments sites, providing users extremely high level of online payment security.

In recent years, there has been a quick rise of internet users purchasing online, fast reaching the one quarter mark. Such growth has shown maturity in key previous barriers which include online payment security, and the product delivery process of electronic commerce.

Check out Internet Marketing for Small Business for more information on Online Businesses.

Quick Response Codes = QR Codes

QR codes are not complicated codes that serve to confuse our lives. In fact, they are simply codes designed in a pattern format and arranged in squarish blocks place onto a white background. These codes are embedded with information meant as advertising and promotion messages that can be accessed via one simple click on your mobile device. Companies big and small, have jumped onto the QR Code Bandwagon and begun to tap on the vast potential of this marketing avenue, ranging from pushing coupons, time-sensitive offers, discount promotions or simply advertising their wares or launching a new product, not to mention also conducting branding exercises too.

The key reason why companies of all sizes can tap on this marketing channel is due to the fact that the QR code is a versatile tool to say the least. You can choose to embed all kinds of information about your product, company for any type of marketing activity you can think of, such as launching a local-based marketing campaign or a regionalised advertising exercise. In fact, you can also use QR codes for surveys and gather consumer feedback about on products or services.

And if you are a local small business owner who is looking to building your customer list of mobile numbers, there is no other more direct and effective approach than tapping on the QR codes to build that list. And if you have a website or a Facebook Fanpage, you could also use your QR code to drive traffic to them.

All that said about the endless uses and benefits of QR codes, and still many businesses do not know enough of the benefits of it and hence shun away from this very efficient and cost effective tool. It is indeed sad that ignorance and fear of avant-garde technology is standing in their way of business bottom lines. Here are more advantages of QR codes to sway your stand.

Low Cost and Paper Free Channel

The way QR codes works is that you simply click on them and view the data or information embedded in them. You can view it any time at your own convenience. As you can see, this delivery process is literally paper-free and absolutely low or no cost to you. Not only do you get to play your part to foster a green environment, you also save on costly reprints of your advertising and marketing collaterals.

Curiosity-Enhanced Excitement Generates Sales

That QR code is indeed an odd looking square mash of tiny black dots on them. As this is a fairly new approach to marketing, many consumers are still not widely exposed to this tool and many would be curious as to what is embedded within the code. This could lead them to click into the icons for more information and eventually generate greater sales.

Instant Response For Product or Company Information Requests

By Quick Response Code, it literally means instant response. Now you no longer need to wait indefinitely for that product information email to come by in your inbox, or wait endlessly for the snail mail to come. Potential consumers will appreciate the instant access to pertinent information.

While QR codes is still a novel concept it has indeed caught on and it will not be long before businesses compete in this arena fast and furiously selling their wares.

Check out more on Mobile Media Marketing and Small Business Marketing Strategies.

Targeted Email Marketing Strategy

As stated in Part 2 of this series, targeted email marketing is the internet version of direct mailing strategy of your promotion marketing mix. While it might seem an easier process to manage than traditional direct mailing, there are particular aspects of the process that you will need to execute care and EQ.

Permission Marketing – Have You Opted In Yet?

Firstly, you must know that with email marketing comes the key concern of mass spamming. In order not to be branded as a spammer, you should install an emailing procedure that does is legitimate. This means that we should request that the interested individual opt-in, that is to give permission for you to email them information. This is what is otherwise known as permission marketing.

Due to the fact that this is rather complicated procedure to follow up with, you should be using an autoresponder. It automates the process from sending emails, follow ups, monitoring click-through rates as well as helps you to manage your customer/contact lists. You can easily find top notch full service autoresponders for less than $20 per month or you might wish to consider customizing one in-house for your particular email marketing needs.

Key Factors Contributing To The Success Of Targeted Email Marketing

Email marketing, if executed correctly, can be a very targeted approach which could bring in lucrative revenues at the click of a few buttons. However, that said, your reputation, brand positioning, customer relationship management skills and customer loyalty contribute cumulatively to this end result.

Email marketing requires an abundance of tact, and effort to build relationships. Sending too many emails to your clients or not keeping in touch often enough could equally result in a high un-subscribe rate. Striking that balance takes a lot of effort, patience and experience over time.

If you should intend to embark upon an targeted email marketing strategy, you must be prepared to spend time and learn the skill of online relationship building. Start a newsletter which keeps your clientele informed and updated, giving away free product samplings or free educational info in the form of ebooks, CDs, DVD, or simply a series of related videos. Flood them with quality value for free, and foster a binding relationship preparing them for your up-sells and cross-sells in the future.

Email Marketing Monetization Strategy

When the fruits of your labor is ripe for picking, you will naturally start to up-sell and cross-sell your products and services to your clientele. You might wish to also plan ahead with a comprehensive email marketing monetization strategy which encompasses marketing your own products to your own list as well as Joint Venture with other list owners to cross sell and up sell each other’s lists. This latter approach has proven extremely lucrative to large list owners. However, that said, you need to have exceptional relationships with your clientele in order to achieve good results from this approach.

To check out the 3 other parts to this series, Click Here.

Also Find out more here about small business marketing strategies and internet marketing for small business too.

In particular, we also shared the importance of having cohesive and coherent messages used by both on and offline marketing activities and this is the key and basis for our discussion on structuring the online strategies into the overall marketing mix. Using a consistent voice across all marketing collaterals is key to your product and brand positioning.

There are two major arms to internet marketing for small business and they are namely, web internet marketing as well as targeted email marketing. The former is a lot more technical than the latter but both are interdependent upon each other in some ways.

Web Internet Marketing

Web internet marketing evolves around website creation, development and driving traffic to your site and generally uses either organic search engine optimization SEO methods or paid web traffic, that is, paid advertising. There two main types of websites platforms you can adopt, wordpress or static sites. WordPress is a common blog platform which has become well customized for marketing purposes in recent years.

Those looking to using organic SEO will prefer the blog platform by consistently loading the sites up with information. As driving traffic to your website is a key criteria to ensuring online growth, organic SEO is a longer-lasting traffic driving system than the paid alternative. That said, paid web traffic can be lucrative and allows you upward scalability as and when you wish.

Targeted Email Marketing Strategy

Targeted email marketing on the other hand, is the online version of traditional direct mailing campaigns which requires contact details like your clients’ email addresses as well as their names. You will need an auto-responder to ensure that your email marketing campaigns are well executed in orderly fashion.

First and foremost, if you intend to execute your targeted email marketing strategy, you need to ally the major concern of mass spamming. You can and should have a built-in filter process to solicit active opt-in into your email list of contacts. By opting in, your contact is deemed to have given you consent to email him or her information and hence you are legitimate opt-in email marketer and not a spammer.

This approach is considered targeted to your specific segments as you have directed your email collection approach at specific people in these segments either by giving a free ebook, CD, video training or some product discounts. And you can then proceed to send them emails to solicit for sales on your products or affiliated products and services.

This is part 2 of a four part series of “Internet Marketing For Small Business”. Check out part 1 and look out for part 3 of this series.

Also, check out Small Business Marketing Strategies for more information here.

Know What Your Target Audience Wants, Then Give It To Them

If you only dig deeper and analyze your target segments in greater details, by asking critical questions like their buying habits, lifestyles, values, needs and how your product fit into their lifestyles, you would be able to derive much deeper understanding of whether your product is a strategic fit into their lives.

The more intimately you are acquainted with your target customers the easier is your task of winning them over into your camp. And this is what brand positioning strategy is all about. Center your Brand, product and business around your target audience, connect with them and help them fulfill their needs, make them feel that you have created your Brand and products that are specifically For them.

Foster Two Way Communication For Brand Loyalty

Open up a two way communication with your customers and potential ones to facilitate exchange about the products and your Brand via one-on-one interviews or focus group surveys. Although this is in actual fact a multi-way communication with all your customers, making it look two-way is the key to fostering positive vibes about your Brand with each and every consumer. Speak their lingo and grow the Brand hand in hand, as this will subconsciously give ownership of the Brand to them foster deep brand loyalty eventually without you having to run expensive brand positioning campaigns.

Reinforce Your Brand Persona

When you live your Brand, it is not only you who would be walking and talking your Brand, but everyone in your business from employees, partners and vendors, community members, friends, and customers should be made known the specifics of your Brand persona. Create a company or community event with the purpose of subtly reinforcing brand positioning across all platforms from staff, partners and customers.

The above would be good timing to launch an awareness drive of the meaning of your logo design, taglines, other paperwork and marketing materials, letterheads, business cards and most importantly too, product packaging. Run contests on your website to expand the scope of awareness, utilising free publicity, tapping on the power of press releases etc. While you may find that this aspects of reinforcing your Brand persona may seem superfluous but it is important to take note that the above are indeed proven Brand positioning strategies that work.

Small business marketing strategies succeed in bringing in the revenues when executed appropriately in the right environment and timing with the right people. That said, change is also omni-present and we must always be on the alert to tap onto creative forms self promotion.

On top of that, your Brand Persona must change with the times, hence requiring you to constantly re-evaluate the attributes, values and beliefs that it upholds. Grow your Brand with your customers and with the times. That Coca Cola is still very much alive and kicking after 125 years from its debut is testament to this branding strategy.

The main advantages of mobile marketing over existing forms of marketing strategies is its inherent capability to have extensive reach but at the same time, are more affordable.

If you get down to the basics of what drives business, it is simply these two equations, namely, the number of leads generated as well as lead-to-sale conversion efficiency. When you use traditional forms of marketing tactics to generate leads, the cost effectiveness is low. However, with mobile marketing, you will not have much less problems turning over high lead-to-sale conversion as well as the generation of leads.

The Conventional Marketing Approach

Take for instance you spend $10,000 on a booth for 10 days at the centre of a shopping mall to launch your new product and run an introductory product redemption promotion. You tap on the traffic from the mall but note that about 40 percent are repeat traffic of mall staff, hence hurting your potential to generate your target number of leads. Would this be the best use of your financial and manpower resources to introduce your new product which is carried across all major supermarkets within the vicinity? This is also not a good strategy for lead-to-sale conversion either.

The Mobile Marketing Approach

Or would you rather run a mobile marketing campaign with text marketing messages to potential customers for a free redemption of your new product at any supermarkets by simply producing that text message to the cashiers? And did I mention that you probably spend less than a third that budget of your shopping mall launch project?

To top this off, you would probably be able to tap on the mobile marketing companies which provide a wide reach of market segments which you could drill down to target very specific target audiences. This capability will enable you to market to the most suitable potential buyers. This approach would not only generate for you your desired number of leads but also a much higher lead-to-sale conversion.

Instead of running unprofitable conventional promotions wasting both financial and manpower resources, using mobile marketing is seems a more viable and successful alternative. It is capable of helping you reduce business and marketing costs as well as enhancing efficiency.

The ability of mobile marketing to enable two way or multi-way communication enhances your brand building strategies, interactivity and also helps you elevate your customer service to a different level.

There are indeed more ways than these for mobile marketing to build your brand, your products, and your business. Its potential is limited by only your innovation and creativity. Its boundaries stretch beyond conventional marketing, and mobile marketing is indeed a multi-purpose tool surpassing most traditional marketing approaches in profit maximization.

The Power of Word of Mouth – Testimonials

No matter how great your products are, It is what your customers have to say about them that either make or break your success story. Getting existing customers who are satisfied and happy with your products to say it out loud, expound the benefits and personally endorse your products is the best testimonials you could ever get.

Check out their permission to publish their testimonials for marketing and advertising purposes. Do not underestimate the positive impact that customer testimonials have on helping you build credibility and trust. This approach can be used as an effective branding strategy if you work that into your marketing campaigns properly.

Critical Pricing Perceptions – Affordability

Yes it is all about the perception. Reality does not change but many buyers simply perceive affordability to be more palatable when you breakdown your pricing into “12 monthly instalments” instead of a hefty 550 dollar one time payment. Or the “less than 2 dollar a day and you can own this comfy couch Right Now” pitch never seem to lose its magic.

Perception of affordability also includes rounding down of the dollar, such as $19.90 or $19.70 rather than $20. This pricing tactic gives the perception that the item is less expensive.

Captivating Headlines and Taglines For Slogans

Use attention grabbing headlines to catch potential customers’ attention. Invoke their curiosity, and generate extensive eyeballing. Profound headline and taglines are capable of conveying intense and deep messages to potential buyers. This is Adverstisements 101 for you.

What Is In An Irresistible Compelling Offer?

Provide an offer which, in the perception of your potential buyers, too good to give up. Pricing is only a small part of the equation, package your offer such that the real value of sum of its parts is greater that the whole, and a lot greater at that too. Gifts and bonus products, free travel size packages that come with the purchase, or accumulation of points for attractive redemption that one must have.

“Offer Expiring in two days”, “80% discount of products will end tomorrow” are some of the motivation tactics used by retailers to push for more sales. Run campaigns which cost you little but enhance the bottom line.

Expound On Your Benefits Not Features

Many marketers tend to sell the features rather than the benefits of their products and hence achieve mediocre results. A feature of a portable food warmer is “keeps your food warm” while a benefit is “enables you freedom to bring your toddler out and feed him wherever you may be”.

Note that your potential customers buy from you because they want to enjoy the benefits of your product. They can easily read the features on the labels. Most products have an emotional tag which drives buyers. Use NLP’s “feel” perception to build on the benefits, add on the emotive aspects to your sales pitch.

For more information on this series, check out part 1 at New Business Startups – Timeless Small Business Marketing Strategies That Always Work.

Check out Small Business Marketing Strategies if you are planning on new business startups.

A little strategizing with your business planning could actually help you manage the new business startups. The key reason that I stress new business startups is such that you could start everything new and afresh but if you already have an existing business up, you could make the necessary adjustments to grow it effectively. Here are some of the key timeless small business marketing strategies that never fail to work.

What Is Your Key USP? – Unique Selling Proposition, That Is…

Brand your product into that perception niche that you wish to dominate you’re your authentic Unique Selling Proposition. Stand out from the mundane, shine bright with your USP, make and fulfil your promise to customers. If your USP is 1 hour delivery time within a 40 mile radius, then you should honour that promise, else your reputation will go down the drain. If your promise is to ensure that children who attend your tutoring classes will achieve at least one “A” grade for one subject within three months, you jolly well make sure that the children achieve what you promise the parents.

Customer Retention vs Customer Acquisition – Which Should You Choose?

Which is a cheaper option, customer retention or customer acquisition? The answer is obvious of course, it is Customer retention. Did you know that it costs about six times more to attract a new customer as it would to keep and milk an existing one? And research has shown that the success probability of selling to a new customer is 1 out of 16 as compared to that of 2.2 when selling to existing customers.

Yes, you would have to spend 6 times more money for new customer acquisition, money which could literally be spent on growing and building your existing customer base as well as forging more lucrative joint ventures with complimentary business partnerships. Of course with new business startups, you will surely need to spend on customer acquisition strategies in order to grow your customer list. The key to customer retention is relationship building with them to establish trust and credibility.

Cross-selling and Up-selling – How and When Should You Do It?

Cross selling and Upselling have become very successful as small business marketing strategies these days. Of course for new business startups you will need to spend time growing your customer lists, build bonding rapport with them before you start to sell to them. Indeed, it might be easier to cross sell to existing clientele in this environment of economic downturn as existing customers are already familiar with you and more trust has been built.

That said however, you should be very sure that you are not overtly pushy with your upsells as upsells mean selling more expensive items to your list. You need to know your clientele profiles sufficiently well in order to achieve your selling objectives, yet keep them loyal at the same time. From a needs perspective, customers must have a compelling need or want for your product to buy it. And your task is to invoke that desire to possess the product by expounding on the USP which meets their needs.

Stay tuned for part 2 of this series of New Business Startups – Timeless Small Business Marketing Strategies That Always Work. Yes, starting your own small business may not be as difficult as you are led to believe.

Check out Small Business Marketing Strategies for more information here.

And depending on what you construe from the above title you would have very different expectations of this post. The crux lies in the fact of what you deem as a great article and more importantly, what purpose you want this great article to achieve for you.

To avoid confusion, let’s just say that you intend for this article to be posted onto your own website to drive traffic to your products or services which you sell or are an affiliate marketer. Do Not confuse this with the articles written with the sole objective of mass submission to article directories.

Always bear in mind that what you put up in your own website must be of the best quality. Assume that your content is to solve a problem and provide a step by step process in the process.

The Compelling Eye-Catching Headlines

We start now with the headline, which is the key component of an article that could make or break your traffic expectations. Needless to say, you will need to have an attractive and eye-catching headline before you can sell your wares. Over the course of my endless testing, here are some of the more successful ones:

• XXX – Fact or Myth?
• The Truth About XXX
• 3, 5 or 7 top ideas for XXX
• What You Did Not Know about XXX
• What You Must Know About XXX
• How to XXX the Best Way
• 10 Ways to XXX

One of the simplest and effective article layouts to start you off with is as follows:

Proven Effective Article Outline

• Eye-catching and Gripping Headline
• Introduction – Opening paragraph of the problem or issue
• At least Two or Three paragraphs on the solutions, either in a step by step approach or 2 or 3 ways to solve the problems.
• Conclusion
• Resource Reference or links to the solutions – either your products or affiliate products.

3-Minute Crash Course On Search Engine Optimization For Your Post

Here are some Key Article/Post SEO Must Know Tips

• Title Tag – Literally known as your Post tile or Post heading. Only use the main keyword once in your title
• Meta Descriptions – This is your post description and you are advised to keep it short, less than 70 characters.
• Keyword Tag – This used to be critical for the search engines to find your post, but due to the black sheep of the internet fraternity, key search engines have rated down this category a lot over the years. But still do insert the main keywords you are trying to dominate as some search engines will still utilities this field.
• Image Links – Images have their places in the internet too. Insert your keywords in the Alt text field.

Other Key SEO Must Know Tips

• Bold, Underline and Italicize your keywords with moderation. This is preferably to be done in the first paragraph.
• Keep your Keyword density between 3 to 5%
• Include your main keyword once in your URL if possible
• Write With Your Heart – Readers Can Sense Your Sincerity

One final tip I am always most willing to share with any of my readers is that you should always write with your heart. That will get you many more readers than simply search engine spiders. So touch your readers, and the spiders will come, for sure..

Click here for more information on article marketing and Internet Marketing for Small Business for more online strategies.

Amidst the rush to plan your strategies and budget constraints, take a step back, a deep breathe and relax. Here are some tips to help you reduce the season’s budgeting and planning stress to a maximum.

Put On Your Strategic Hat

It is time to think strategy and from an overall broad business perspective rather than a tactical point of view. With a clear mind and well thought out business strategy, you can then begin to make more rational and critical decisions. Consider what drives your business cumulatively, and the management constrains which include financial and manpower resources. Use a funnel strategy whenever you strategise and plan.

It is important that you have a good start at the inception. You and your team should set aside an hour or two alternate days of the work week to brains storm on small business marketing ideas. The alternate days are to ensure that you and the team have enough time to think about the ideas in depth, and also have a breather in between days. An hour or two per session is deemed a right amount of time for brainstorming as too short a period achieves nothing and too long a period can drag on without achieve your objectives.

Brainstorming For Green Elephants And Purple Moons

When brainstorming, you and your team are encouraged to think outside the box, let new and innovative ideas flow naturally. In fact, your brainstorming white board, nothing is impossible, inclusive of having green elephants or purple moons (metaphorically speaking).

Never suppress the contribution of ideas, do not let preconceived notions negate the viabilities and always assume that every idea is workable until tested. Let everyone have their say and contribute to instill sense of ownership of the idea.

How Adaptable Is Your Marketing Plan?

Doing business is a very fluid process, and anything unpredictable can happen at anytime. So my advise to you is that your marketing plan should be come with “shock absorbers and springs on their legs” so that it can be flexible enough to absorb the unexpected when it happens and bounce back to form almost immediately. This is the art of business survival and your springs and shock absorption system are your key tools to excel beyond survival.

Not only should you have these mechanism in place, you should also be able to scan changes in your business environment which could literally open up for more marketing opportunities. Have a well oiled marketing mechanism which adapts well to the ever-changing times, especially in these times of economic uncertainty. Building in a high degree of flexibility can help you save a lot of unnecessary or miscalculated expenses.

Set S.M.A.R.T. Goals for Accountability and Instil Sense of Responsibility

Every specific goal you set should consist of attributes which are measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound. When your project is completed and upon evaluation, you will have a set of guidelines to gauge the level of success achieved, or execute the improvement plan.

This gives your staff and yourself a sense of accountability as well as a duty to ensure success in the projects you undertake.

Set Explicit Marketing Timeliness Especially For Time Sensitive Projects

All projects must come to an end, or rather, all projects will eventually be completed. Whether you complete them in record timing or on extended timing, will eventually means profit or loss to your bottom line. A marketing plan time line is key to measuring the effectiveness and implementation success of any project that you embark upon. Events management, overseas exhibitions and shooting of an advertisement message are marketing tactics whose success largely depends upon.

From a broad perspective, every stage of the marketing plan from strategy formulation, tactics planning to implementation of each of the tactics should each have an individual marketing time line to ensure that each and every one of the activities are completed within a time period.

Less Is More, So Clean Up Your Marketing List

It is better to leverage on a short list of marketing activities and optimize its revenue potential. Otherwise, you might encounter system overload should you implement a series of small business marketing ideas without the support of sufficient manpower or budget. Eventually this could hurt rather than benefit your business reputation, as well as bottom line.

Match your company’s strength and potential business opportunities whenever you plan your projects and one key promotion mix tactic would be marketing joint ventures which could literally expand your market reach many folds and joint benefits to both parties.

If this is not the first time you are working on your marketing plan, go through your past marketing strategies and tactics. Adapt the successful ones and discard the failures. Remember that the market is a dynamic force made up of consumers, competitors and governing bodies and any of these can create changes to in the market at any point in time. Old ideas may not work anymore.

Chase Your Screen Saver!

Do up a catchy slogan and your SMART goals screen saver message. This will serve as a daily reminder as well as motivation to push you forward.

Writing a marketing plan should never be a pain. In fact, you should have fun working out your small business marketing ideas with your team. Achieving them together with their help can give your entire team greater satisfaction of sweet success.