Saturday, June 18, 2011
Using Social Media To Market Your Small Business For Free!
When it comes to operating a small business you MUST advertise. Just setting up shop and expecting people to show up won't cut it. You have to advertise your business on some scale for it to be successful. Advertising your business can be expensive however and take up huge chunks of your small business operating budget. There are however several alternatives to newspaper or magazine advertising and some of them cost only a little bit of time and effort on the part of the small business owner.
USING FACEBOOK TO ADVERTISE YOUR BUSINESS
There's no escaping Facebook, it's everywhere and everyone seems to be on it, posting every second of their life for the world to read. While you may think that your business has no place on Facebook you might be surprised to find out that businesses are gaining new clients via Facebook. And, their current clients and website visitors are telling others about their business using Facebook. There is even a way for you to use Facebook to advertise your business without ever posting to Facebook, you don't even need a Facebook account for Facebook to work for your business. All you need to do is place a Facebook LIKE button on your business website. Then visitors can like your business website, that appears on their Facebook wall and can be clicked on by anyone reading their wall. In effect they have just sent an advertisement about your business to all of their friends on Facebook.
USING TWITTER TO ADVERTISE YOUR BUSINESS
Similar to Facebook your business can also benefit from Twitter, without having a Twitter account or sending a single Tweet. Again all you have to do is set up a TWEET button on your business website and your website visitors will do the tweeting for you. When they click on the TWEET button on your website they send your website link out to their Twitter followers. That's not the only way to advertise using Twitter however. If you have a brick and mortar business be sure and put out a sign up sheet for a mailing list. Ask for your customer's email address and permission to send them monthly deals, discounts, news about your business etc... and then follow up with an email that asks them to follow you on Twitter. Then using your Twitter account send out a couple of Tweets a month to remind your customers about your business.
USING BLOGS TO ADVERTISE YOUR BUSINESS
Another great way advertise your blog free of charge is to start a blog for your business. Blogs are free, fast and easy to maintain and update. Simply visit a site like blog.com or blogger.com and set up a blog with a name similar to your business name. Then start adding new blog posts about your business. Blog about your location, what you do, where you are, how long you've been in business, new items in your shop or the services you provide, etc. Split this over several blog posts. And don't worry if you are repeating information from your website, people may find the blog before they ever see your website, so the information needs to be there. The good thing about setting up a blog on a free site instead of having one installed on your existing website is that Google quickly picks up blogger and blog.com blogs while it may take them a while to find your blog if it's hosted by your current small business website host.
If your business doesn't have a website you are LOSING business to your competition. THEY HAVE A WEBSITE!
Visit http://www.logodesign-webdesign.com to get a great website for your business at a super affordable rate.
USING FACEBOOK TO ADVERTISE YOUR BUSINESS
There's no escaping Facebook, it's everywhere and everyone seems to be on it, posting every second of their life for the world to read. While you may think that your business has no place on Facebook you might be surprised to find out that businesses are gaining new clients via Facebook. And, their current clients and website visitors are telling others about their business using Facebook. There is even a way for you to use Facebook to advertise your business without ever posting to Facebook, you don't even need a Facebook account for Facebook to work for your business. All you need to do is place a Facebook LIKE button on your business website. Then visitors can like your business website, that appears on their Facebook wall and can be clicked on by anyone reading their wall. In effect they have just sent an advertisement about your business to all of their friends on Facebook.
USING TWITTER TO ADVERTISE YOUR BUSINESS
Similar to Facebook your business can also benefit from Twitter, without having a Twitter account or sending a single Tweet. Again all you have to do is set up a TWEET button on your business website and your website visitors will do the tweeting for you. When they click on the TWEET button on your website they send your website link out to their Twitter followers. That's not the only way to advertise using Twitter however. If you have a brick and mortar business be sure and put out a sign up sheet for a mailing list. Ask for your customer's email address and permission to send them monthly deals, discounts, news about your business etc... and then follow up with an email that asks them to follow you on Twitter. Then using your Twitter account send out a couple of Tweets a month to remind your customers about your business.
USING BLOGS TO ADVERTISE YOUR BUSINESS
Another great way advertise your blog free of charge is to start a blog for your business. Blogs are free, fast and easy to maintain and update. Simply visit a site like blog.com or blogger.com and set up a blog with a name similar to your business name. Then start adding new blog posts about your business. Blog about your location, what you do, where you are, how long you've been in business, new items in your shop or the services you provide, etc. Split this over several blog posts. And don't worry if you are repeating information from your website, people may find the blog before they ever see your website, so the information needs to be there. The good thing about setting up a blog on a free site instead of having one installed on your existing website is that Google quickly picks up blogger and blog.com blogs while it may take them a while to find your blog if it's hosted by your current small business website host.
If your business doesn't have a website you are LOSING business to your competition. THEY HAVE A WEBSITE!
Visit http://www.logodesign-webdesign.com to get a great website for your business at a super affordable rate.
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