29 May 2012
internet marketing • small business

Google Earth Pro – Is It For Your Business?


Many of you have already used Google Earth.  If you haven’t, I don’t know what you’re waiting for.  But, you may not be aware that their is a PRO version.  It’s $400.00 per year and it may just be something that your business can use.

Google’s Small Business Blog has a great article on Google Earth Pro – check it out!  There’s even a link to a free 7 day trial version.

But Is Google Earth Pro For YOUR Business?

Well, if your business has anything to do with the earth’s terrain, then YES.

Here are some ideas from Google’s article on the type of businesses can use Google Earth Pro and how they can use it.

  • Advanced measuring tools: Quickly and easily measure and stylize complex polygons. Property developers and building designers can quickly estimate the area and perimeter of a property. Afterward, they can quickly stylize the polygon so it’s easily seen on their map.
  • Save premium imagery: Save premium images of the maps you create in Earth Pro for inclusion in your business materials. Save a premium image of all your customer locations to share with your investors.
  • Bulk data import: Import and stylize CSV files (with address or lat/long data), GIS shapefiles, or GPS data to include in the maps you create. Real estate agents quickly upload and locate all the properties in their portfolios by importing CSV files containing the addresses of their properties.
  • U.S. premium data layers: Take advantage of the robust U.S. Demographic, Parcel and Traffic Count data layers that are a part of the Earth Pro package. Architects fly to the location of their next project, use the parcel data layer to find the parcel number, and use the parcel number to find the zoning restrictions for the property they’ll be working on.
  • Movie Maker: Quickly and easily create high-definition movies. Nature touring companies create high-definition videos using Earth Pro that take you along the path of their tours.

I thought these were very interesting.  Of course, you will want to measure it’s effectiveness, both in any cost cutting measures as well as how well they bring in revenue.  Just like most things on the Internet, it’s all about trying and testing!

What do you think?


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26 May 2012
business tips • internet marketing • social media

Grabbing Social Media By The ….


By now, you have probably conceded to the fact that there’s no turning away from social media.  If your website doesn’t have icons for your facebook, twitter, google+, linkedin and pinterest accounts – then you’re considered old and out of touch.  Ugh, it’s a case of constant catch up!

Being Proactive With Your Social Media

Some companies have taken the social media game to the top levels. One in particular, is The Catalyst Partnership. They’ve embraced the new Pinterest program and are sharing their knowledge and expertise with the world, and they are doing it beautifully! Just take a look at their Pinterest page! It’s a treasure trove of information AND visual appeal.

The end result of this is that their infographics are being passed around from person to person and they have created their own “sales force” (so to speak). Their cleverly written and artfully displayed infographics are user friendly for everyone – business owners to webmasters!

What Can We Learn From This Social Media Muse?

Well, they took something familiar (social media) and turned it into something spectacular. They embraced what the medium had to offer and used it for their own lessons. Pinterest is a visual medium, the whole idea is to share graphics, photos of your interests. They turned boring content (well, it’s not all boring but you know what I mean) into visually appealing graphics. Simple and brilliant.

So, what do you think? What can you do with YOUR business? How can you use social media in a way that is new and creative?


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25 May 2012
small business • social media

Geek Pride Day!!


Hey everyone, today, May 25, 2012 is Geek Pride Day!!!

Embrace your geekiness and celebrate the day!!

“Tim McEachern organized unconnected events called Geek Pride Festival and/or Geek Pride Day 1998 to 2000 at a bar in Albany, New York, which are sometimes seen as a prelude to Geek Pride Day.”
     Wikipedia 

I believe that in truth, everyone has some geekiness in them.  I mean, the definition of a Geek is…

A person with an eccentric devotion to a particular interest: i.e. – “a computer geek”.

To help celebrate Geek Pride Day – I thought I would put together a list of some of my favourite Geek things!

1) http://www.wired.com/geekdad/

2) Tech Monkey   

3)  Geeky Gadgets

4) Think Geek

5) Geeky Socks

6) Big Bang Theory

7) Team Starkid

8) Geek Mom

You know, when I really think about it – being Geeky is really just about being passionate.  If you’re passionate about sports, you’re called a sports junkie, if you’re passionate about baking, you could be called a Foodie.  Well, if you’re passionate about Sy Fy and Tech and everything that is related to those things, you’re generally called Geeky.

I love my geekiness and I’m out and proud!

Happy Geek Pride Day Y’All!!

 


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21 May 2012
internet marketing • seo

Unlock Your Internet Marketing


Here at Eckweb we work with very small businesses, for the most part.  We have a few larger clients but that’s only because they started out with us as very small businesses and have grown.  (We’re so proud of that!)

Anyway, the one conversation we have with everyone circles around getting traffic to the website.  How do we do it?  What is needed?  How much will it cost?  All valid questions from business owners.  Our answers are always the same.  We answer with…

1) “Find out what your target audience wants, and then give it to them.”

2) “Make yourself an expert in your field.”

3) “Constantly put new information out there – whether it’s your website, your blog, your social media accounts, whatever – just be active.”

There’s Really No Internet Marketing Secret

The bottom line is, and the absolute truth is, there is no one trick or magical program that will bring your website a ton of traffic.  In fact, your traffic comes mostly from small numbers, not big ones.  Here’s what I mean…

I reviewed 5 websites, all different types of business and across the country and the numbers just may surprise you.

Site 1 – Total number of keywords that brought in 5 or less visitors = 687
Total number of keywords that brought in 6 or more visitors = 26

Site 2 – Total number of keywords that brought in 5 or less visitors = 329
Total number of keywords that brought in 6 or more visitors = 17

Site 3 – Total number of keywords that brought in 5 or less visitors = 455
Total number of keywords that brought in 6 or more visitors = 21

Site 4 – Total number of keywords that brought in 5 or less visitors = 209
Total number of keywords that brought in 6 or more visitors = 9

Site 5 – Total number of keywords that brought in 5 or less visitors = 379
Total number of keywords that brought in 6 or more visitors = 13

What Does This Tell You?

Basically, the majority of people that come to website are coming in with very specific keyword phrases.  This is absolutely normal, common.  More people will ALWAYS come to a website using their own specific niche phrases.  For you, the business owner, this means that you MUST have that information on your website in order to get the search engines to even bring up your website when the viewer types in their phrase.

So, don’t focus so much on getting traffic for a main keyword phrase – instead – focus on the niche phrases.  You’ll get more targeted traffic that way.

 

 


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21 May 2012
internet marketing • ppc marketing • seo • small business

Which Is Better, SEO or PPC?


A very common question asked by small business owners, “Which is better, SEO or PPC?”.

The answer can be a little complicated but it doesn’t have to be. Let’s see if I can help you make the best decision for your business.

First, let’s make sure we’re both on the same page as far as understanding the difference between SEO and PPC.

1) SEO (Search Engine Optimization) – is the process of working on the website content and coding in order to help it come up in the search engines for specific searches.  These results are on the left hand side of your Google search.

2) PPC (Pay Per Click) – is the process of bidding on keyword phrases and creating advertisements for these keyword phrases (which point to your website of course).  These results are on the right hand side of your Google search.  Sometimes you’ll also see PPC ads at the very top of the left hand side as well.

Now, what can each of these give your small business?  Knowing their differences will help you make the decision as to which one is better for your bottom line.  We’ll go through these with some FAQ.

1) How Long Before I See Results?

SEO will always take longer than PPC.  You can create a PPC advertisement and within 15-20 minutes, that ad will be showing up (depending on your settings of course).  But we can work on the SEO for a website and we may not see the results of that work for several weeks or months.  It depends on the amount of competition for the keyword phrase that is being marketed.

2) What Can I Expect To Spend?

SEO marketing is usually fixed to a certain extent.  Eckweb’s monthly marketing is $210.00 per month and that includes adding 1 new page to the website (clients provide the content and graphics).  So, it’s much easier to budget what will be spent with SEO marketing.

PPC marketing is fluid.  You may begin your marketing campaign bidding $2.00 per click on a specific keyword phrase but your competitors will begin upping that bid to gain ground so by the end of 2-3 months you may end up paying $5.00 per click.  That’s just the nature of PPC marketing.  The only way to avoid this is to keep changing keyword phrases (to go after keyword phrases that can bring you traffic for only $2.00 per click).

3) How Much Time Will I Be Spending On This Campaign?

SEO marketing inherently involves adding content to your website, on hopefully, a regular basis.  Daily, weekly, monthly, whatever – it’s up to the business owner.  Of course, the writing can be outsourced to someone else in the company or to a professional SEO Copywriter.  So, the amount of time spent on this aspect will depend on how the business owner wants to manage it.

Most business owners do not participate in the actual coding and website development process – so this is not an issue as far as time spent.

PPC marketing, if managed by an Internet Marketing firm will take very little time away from the business owner.  Once the parameters are set up in the PPC account – it’s just a matter of making the decision to spend more dollars or change keyword phrases every now and then.  Of course, if the business owner is managing his/her own PPC campaign then the amount of time spent can vary greatly, depending on how much knowledge he/she has and how much time is needed on the research.

Both marketing programs will require time to be spent reviewing the analysis of the campaigns.  It’s extremely important to keep checking if the campaigns are working or not.  And to make changes to the aspects of the campaigns that are not working.

The Bottom Line, Which Is Better, SEO or PPC?

The conclusion is that IF you have a limited budget, you will want to go with SEO marketing.  IF you absolutely need traffic to the website immediately, then you will want to go with PPC marketing but be prepared to pay.

I do hope this information was helpful.  If not, or if you have other questions about Internet Marketing, contact me at Eckweb.  I’m here to help.


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19 May 2012
business tips

Are Your Visitors Getting What They Need?


I’m reading this interesting article and it has some interesting stats…

  • 60% of business websites don’t have a contact number on the home page, making a person have to browse through the site for the “Contact” page.
  • 74.7% of business websites don’t even have an email link on the front page. If you are afraid of spam, many solutions exist to get rid of it.
  • 65.7% of web presences don’t include a form that would allow customers to ask about a product or request more info about the company.
  • 93.3% of business websites don’t conform to standards for mobile phone web programming, which makes it difficult to acquire customer loyalty from mobile junkies.

What do you think?  Is your website in any of these categories?  More than one?  OOPS!

Just An Idea

It’s not a bad idea to ask others to look over your website, preferably folks who have never seen your site before.  You may just be surprised at what they end up telling you.  It’s very easy for anyone who stares at a picture long enough that they easily miss somethings.  Same with websites.

Don’t take it for granted that it’s as good as it can get, there’s no such thing when it comes to websites.  There’s always room for improvement.


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03 May 2012
small business • social media

Language Barriers Breaking Down


I’m an old Trekkie, I admit it.  And by old I mean that I’ve been a fan since the original series (Yikes I’m old!).  Anyway, one of the “gadgets” they used often was the Universal Translator which translated any language into English or any other language.  After all, they had to communicate with so many difference alien species! – :)

And now, it seems, Google has taken us closer to that reality.  We may not have a Universal Translator that works so smoothly (although my husband loves to use his smart phone with his Korean patients).  We do have Google’s Gmail program which now translates emails.   Mashable reports.. “Gmail‘s automated message translation is no longer an experiment. Now Google’s popular email platform can automatically translate emails from one language to another. So, for example, you can get an email in Japanese and have it translated instantly into English, or communicate with a friend in French without ever knowing the language.”

It’s very cool, I tried it.  I went to Google.it (Italian Google) and typed in Limoncello (a great drink if you’ve never had it) – I found a recipe for it (in Italian of course) – copied and pasted it and emailed it to myself.  When I opened it – I was able to translate it with one click and – Ta Da!!!

So, if you have always wanted to communicate with your Italian cousins or Russian relatives but couldn’t because of the language barrier – you can now email with ease! Having pen pals from other countries is now easier than ever!  Hope this helps us to fight with each other less!

 


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02 May 2012
business tips • internet marketing • small business • social media

Google Giving Your Business More Exposure!


Google has been working, since April 2010 on a Business Photos Program. Basically, the idea is to provide businesses with a local photographer that apparently has been approved by Google to take photos and/or virtual tours of the business. These photos/videos are then put on Google searches, Google Maps, Google Places and who knows where else?

The Google Small Business blog has a great story on it.  Apparently it’s been successful enough that Google is now expanding it to other countries and they’re looking for more photographers to sign up to the program. Here’s a link to a photographer in the Atlanta, Georgia area just to give you an idea of the kind of photographers in the program.

It’s a really great idea – imagine looking for a restaurant and being able to take a virtual tour of that restaurant before you set foot in there?  I can see this working well for Bed and Breakfasts, animal day care centers, boutiques and many other places.  Very Cool.

Check out Google’s Business Photos program – it may just be the thing your business needs!


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01 May 2012
social media

Facebook Frustrates Me!!


Okay, I know everyone on the planet seems to love Facebook (except me) and I’m really working on changing my attitude but today, is not going to be one of those days!

I received an email from a course I signed up for and in the email was a link to their Facebook page – so – I clicked on it and I was brought directly to their page. Cool. All I wanted to do was to “follow” them – include them in my facebook feed so that I can keep up with their news. But the follow, friend, fan, whatever button was nowhere – I clicked here, there and everywhere only to get so frustrated I just left.

Now, I’m on the Internet 14+ hours a day – I’m no genius, I admit, but I’m no dummy either. I know my way around the Internet and websites. So, when I can’t figure out how to use a website, something is wrong with that website!

Well, what about you? Do you LOVE Facebook or do you just tolerate it because it’s the flavour of the month/year/decade? Let me know!

Twitter Rules!


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24 Apr 2012
article writing • internet marketing • seo

Writing Content – Some Inspiration


I talk alot about writing new content for websites, blogs and how important it is.  I mean really, Internet users type in words in search engines (or is it on search engines?) anyway, all these engines can do then is look for those words on pages.

But, I will concede, as I think anyone who does any writing will, it’s not always easy to write.  I found this on my Pinterest account and thought it was worth sharing. I hope you think so too.

22 Ways to Create Compelling Content - Infographic
Like this infographic? Get more content marketing tips from Copyblogger.


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