As a web development company working with businesses throughout the country, we get a great deal of questions regarding driving traffic to a website.  Almost always the customer leads the discussion to SEO, and while we think a proper, yet basic, SEO setup is warranted, our belief is that fresh content drives both traffic and indexing.

Participation in blogging, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter are far less expensive than both ongoing SEO work and traditional advertising and have the potential to quickly reach exponentially more people, yet we still hear the following reasoning NOT to participate:

1.  ”We are too busy.”

(Response:  That’s great, especially in this economy, but if you’re busy, your competition has taken notice, and is doing EVERYTHING they can to take business away from you, EVERYTHING.)

2.  ”We don’t know anything about computers.”

(Response:  Business is dynamic.  It is no longer sufficient to open a local brick and mortar business, and hope for the best.  Be proactive, learn what to do–blog about the passion you feel for your business.  If you have an antique store, blog and video blog about your passion for the pieces in your shop.  If you own a restaurant blog and Twitter about your specials and anything going on such as live music–I promise you, your customers want to know!)

3.  ”Our customers are not online.”

(Response:  If your customers are seniors, they are the fastest growing demographic online, and, as they move into retirement, their children and those taking their positions at companies that may be your clients, are online.)

4.  ”I tried Twitter and had only 8 people following me.”

(Response:  Social Media Marketing is a long-term investment.  You cannot be online for a couple of weeks and expect major changes, yet time invested will have a lasting effect.)

5.  ”I don’t like Facebook.”

(Response:  Facebook recently crossed the 350 million person threshold.  Your customers are there, if you don’t connect to them there–someone else will, that’s for sure!  And while you are considering spending a few thousand dollars to create one of those awful local cable TV advertisements, you could spend a fraction of that money to advertise via pay-per-click on Facebook in only your geographic area, and reach far more people.)

As a reader of this blog, what are your thoughts about businesses using Social Media to market themselves?  Do you have questions about getting started, or have you had some specific success or failures?

Your input and thoughts are welcome.

Preston Ehrler, Webvantix

We recently created a video that’s been sitting on our server for a while…I’ve finally dropped it into YouTube–enjoy it with some Reggae.

Best viewed if you hit the HD (High-Definition) button in the lower right of the player.

Let us know what you think!

Preston Ehrler, Webvantix

Here are a few thoughts on Social Media Marketing and books by Gary Vaynerchuk (Crush It!) and Tamar Weinberg (The New Community Rules:  Marketing on the Social Web).  These are two great books that will enlighten any business when preparing to kick off a social media marketing campaign, and as they are very different, both should be required reading!

As many of you know, I LOVE sales and marketing books.  At the moment I reading Gary Vaynerchuk’s “Crush It!”  A great little book that if nothing else will motivate you to look rather harshly at how you are marketing your company.  Are your efforts tepid and weak at best?  Does your website suck, do you blog to add new content and create interest?  Are you passionate about what you do?

Here’s a video blog by Gary–you can see his passion.  Oh, and by the way, his marketing tactics that employ Social Media (yeah, that social media that you’ve shunned), have taken his family’s wine business in New Jersey Wine Library from $4 mil per year in revenue to $50 mil…I would like that too!  Wow!

Get Crush It! and read it quickly…it’s a small book and only about 150 pages.

You owe it to yourself, your family and your business to understand what you can do now, yes in this terrible economy, to explode your business, while people are busy saying you can’t.

Note, this is no get rich quick scheme, it’s just a lesson in how to begin to utilize the platforms that are out there, and are free, that you probably have not used.

Get passionate!

Preston Ehrler, Webvantix

Is Your Business on Yelp?

As our country’s economic base has morphed from one oriented toward production of actual goods, to a service  orientation (how many real estate agents and financial consultants and personal trainers are out there-whew), there is tremendous clamor for customer acquisition–ask anyone who worked in the 60′s and 70′s and they will tell you, they’ve never seen competition so fierce.  Customer acquisition is the core issue, period.

What that means is that those of us seeking the all-important customer must use every tool in our bag, or as I have loved to say for years, every arrow in our quiver.

That leads me to my Yelp story.

Back in early October I was in Connecticut for my 25th. year high school reunion–ouch (Wilton High School, 1984), that hurts to even type!  One of my closest friends and I were already in the vicinity of the venue, but found we had some extra time before the reunion began, and wanted to have a seat at a nice bar–we are both wine drinkers (he lives in San Francisco, and even makes his own, and it’s amazing).  Like a complete tech-head, I pulled out my iPhone and went straight to Yelp, punched in “Wine Bar” only to find the closest was over in New Canaan, about 30 minutes each way–too far.

We decided to run up to Ridgefield and see what we could find.  By chance we found a great place that had recently opened, the Bissell House Restaurant and Bar.  It’s a really nice place with a beautiful marble bar, and nice wines by the glass (nice, I did not say excellent).

The restaurant had recently opened, and we discussed this with the two bartenders, who, when we mentioned Yelp, had never heard of it, and seemed to dismiss it.  When we left we were chatting with the hostesses and again mentioned how we found the restaurant, and recommended they tell the owner to get onto Yelp–they seemed to roll their eyes and yes us as we left.  I thought nothing more about it and went on to one of the nicest and most wonderful evenings of my life!

When I started thinking about Yelp again, and checking it for restaurants up in my area (the middle of nowhere in Northeastern Pennsylvania), I wondered if I punched in “Wine Bars” in the Connecticut area if the Bissell House Restaurant and Bar would show up…guess what, it’s now on Yelp and even has a warm review.  Lesson:  if you have a brick and mortar shop, restaurant, bar, whatever, get onto Yelp, and begin to look at the other Social Media networks that can help you get exposure…why not?

Do you use any networks to promote your local business?  Let us know!

More ideas on exposure to come.

Preston Ehrler, Webvantix