billythakid
Newbie
- Dec 2, 2011
- 5
- 0
I wanted to help beginners understand the basic elements of SEO and internet marketing. I used an outline to make it as easy as possible to pick and choose relevant info for your situation.
1. The Basics
a. Optimize your website for google rankings
- This includes making sure you have a sitemap indexed, the right keywords in your content, and the right keywords in your website structure (called meta tags).
- In order to take action, first brainstorm a list of your businesses ideal keywords. Yours may be something like: branded objects, marketing
materials, great looking branded material, company shirts, etc.
- You can either google "how to meta tags," "how to create a sitemap" and "how to optimize website content" to figure out how to implement these enhancements yourself, or you can outsource the work and have someone do it for you. If you don't mind spending a few dollars, I'd recommend getting someone to do it for you. I've had this performed for roughly $300.
- Either way, the keywords are your responsibility. I use Google Keyword Tools to help me find good keywords. All you do is type in a keyword or phrase you think is applicable, then the keyword tool will tell you how many times per month that keyword or phrase is being searched for, in addition to the competition for that keyword and similar keywords that may be applicable. Here is the link to that.
b. Newsletters
- This is simple and free, but you have to create the content. You can use a service like mail chimp to send up to like 5,000 emails a month for free. Anything more starts to cost money, but its a good way to get started.
- In your newsletter, talk about what you have new in stock, show some items that you've done recently for customers, etc. Use pictures and conversational content that people will enjoy reading.
- You can get a dolled up template that looks good for free, but there may be some set up required. I'd start without a template only because its easy enough to do on mail chimp right out of the box.
- Send your newsletter to all your previous clients, friends, relatives -- essentially anyone. Think about including a note at the bottom with something like ?Know someone who needs top quality marketing material? Refer them and make X% on their purchase.?
c. Back linking
- This is a good tactic for increasing your exposure on google search results and also on other websites. Essentially its a link exchange program where other websites involved in a similar business as yours will put your link on their website in exchange for you providing their link on your site. You can either actively contact similar websites and discuss this yourself or you can pay someone to do it for you.
- Another good tactic for getting back links to your website is to write creative articles about your niche and then submit them to content directories. People are always searching for ready-made
content on the internet and if you provide that content, people will use it and then link back to your site.
2. Paid Marketing
a. Marketing with adwords
- These are the little highlighted search results that you see at the top of search listings when you search on google. If your unfamiliar with these, google something like "best cookbook" and you'll notice that the first listings that appear are ads (although somewhat well disguised).
- Making these work for you is similar to making your website content rank higher -- its all about the keywords. Using the adwords tool I linked to above, you can see which keywords are getting good search volume with relatively low competition at a decent price.
- For really competitive search terms, youll see that businesses are paying anywhere from $2-5 per click. This can get expensive fast. The best thing to do is find applicable phrases or keywords that are relatively uncompetitive and are averaging from $.3 to $1 per click.
- If you youtube "how to google adwords" you should be able to find some videos that will take you through all the steps of implementing an effective adwords campaign.
b. Marketing with Facebook
- Creating facebook ads is similar to marketing with adwords, except its more targeted and its all about discovery. When someone clicks on one of your ads on google, its because they searched for the keyword you specified. On facebook, its all about ads being displayed only to a certain type of person you
specified. Because "search" isn't facebooks main function, your relying on facebook to place your ads on the page for appropriate users, and then again you pay on a per click basis.
- I haven't personally ran any facebook ads yet, but when I looked into running some targeted ads I found that they were averaging about $1 per click.
- again, youtube ?how to facebook marketing? and you should be able to find some instructional videos on how to create an effective campaign.
Hope this was helpful
1. The Basics
a. Optimize your website for google rankings
- This includes making sure you have a sitemap indexed, the right keywords in your content, and the right keywords in your website structure (called meta tags).
- In order to take action, first brainstorm a list of your businesses ideal keywords. Yours may be something like: branded objects, marketing
materials, great looking branded material, company shirts, etc.
- You can either google "how to meta tags," "how to create a sitemap" and "how to optimize website content" to figure out how to implement these enhancements yourself, or you can outsource the work and have someone do it for you. If you don't mind spending a few dollars, I'd recommend getting someone to do it for you. I've had this performed for roughly $300.
- Either way, the keywords are your responsibility. I use Google Keyword Tools to help me find good keywords. All you do is type in a keyword or phrase you think is applicable, then the keyword tool will tell you how many times per month that keyword or phrase is being searched for, in addition to the competition for that keyword and similar keywords that may be applicable. Here is the link to that.
b. Newsletters
- This is simple and free, but you have to create the content. You can use a service like mail chimp to send up to like 5,000 emails a month for free. Anything more starts to cost money, but its a good way to get started.
- In your newsletter, talk about what you have new in stock, show some items that you've done recently for customers, etc. Use pictures and conversational content that people will enjoy reading.
- You can get a dolled up template that looks good for free, but there may be some set up required. I'd start without a template only because its easy enough to do on mail chimp right out of the box.
- Send your newsletter to all your previous clients, friends, relatives -- essentially anyone. Think about including a note at the bottom with something like ?Know someone who needs top quality marketing material? Refer them and make X% on their purchase.?
c. Back linking
- This is a good tactic for increasing your exposure on google search results and also on other websites. Essentially its a link exchange program where other websites involved in a similar business as yours will put your link on their website in exchange for you providing their link on your site. You can either actively contact similar websites and discuss this yourself or you can pay someone to do it for you.
- Another good tactic for getting back links to your website is to write creative articles about your niche and then submit them to content directories. People are always searching for ready-made
content on the internet and if you provide that content, people will use it and then link back to your site.
2. Paid Marketing
a. Marketing with adwords
- These are the little highlighted search results that you see at the top of search listings when you search on google. If your unfamiliar with these, google something like "best cookbook" and you'll notice that the first listings that appear are ads (although somewhat well disguised).
- Making these work for you is similar to making your website content rank higher -- its all about the keywords. Using the adwords tool I linked to above, you can see which keywords are getting good search volume with relatively low competition at a decent price.
- For really competitive search terms, youll see that businesses are paying anywhere from $2-5 per click. This can get expensive fast. The best thing to do is find applicable phrases or keywords that are relatively uncompetitive and are averaging from $.3 to $1 per click.
- If you youtube "how to google adwords" you should be able to find some videos that will take you through all the steps of implementing an effective adwords campaign.
b. Marketing with Facebook
- Creating facebook ads is similar to marketing with adwords, except its more targeted and its all about discovery. When someone clicks on one of your ads on google, its because they searched for the keyword you specified. On facebook, its all about ads being displayed only to a certain type of person you
specified. Because "search" isn't facebooks main function, your relying on facebook to place your ads on the page for appropriate users, and then again you pay on a per click basis.
- I haven't personally ran any facebook ads yet, but when I looked into running some targeted ads I found that they were averaging about $1 per click.
- again, youtube ?how to facebook marketing? and you should be able to find some instructional videos on how to create an effective campaign.
Hope this was helpful