Social Media - The Best Way for Businesses on a Budget to Promote Themselves Online
In a perfect world we would all like to pay someone to promote our business for us. However, sometimes it just isn't in the budget. There are a lot of things that ambitious business owners and their staffs can do to promote themselves online and drive more traffic to their websites.
That being said, it is always recommended that you develop a marketing strategy. You need to have a written plan of what your goals are and how you will achieve them. You can work with a professional to develop some of the initial ideas and then execute them yourself to save on costs.
Social Media
One of the hot, new ways to promote your business online is through Social Media. Social Media is a way of connecting with people online. Depending on your type of business you can utilize different avenues of social media. Below we will outline some of the more popular social media sites and how a business might benefit from them.
Twitter is a micro blogging website that allows individuals to share small amounts of information with each other. It can be purely social or you can share more business oriented news items.
SonicSpider created SonicTwitter which is specifically for businesses to share news and events without having a Twitter account. These news and events are then fed to websites all over the Internet. Businesses can also put free news feeds on their websites as a way to attract return visits to their websites.
Flickr
If promoting your business involves providing images of your servcies or products, then you want to set up an account with Flickr. Flickr is a way to post images and share them with clients or business partners. You can link your Flickr account to your website and embed images in a static webpage. Flickr is free and a great way to display images online if you are on a budget!
YouTube
If you have a video about your business, you can post it on YouTube. Video is now a new powerful way to generate traffic to your website. Be sure to post keywords that describe the video on YouTube so that yor video is searchable. You can also embed your YouTube video in your website so that your visitors can watch, too!
Get Statisfaction
Do you like to get testimonials and feedback from your clients and business resources? Get Statistaction has a feedback web tool that you can put on your website so that visitors can quickly and easily give you their opinions which can help you attract new clients and improve your business.
Facebook is a social networking site where friends can connect online. However recently, a lot of businesses that want to build online communities, are creating Facebook accounts and groups where their clients can connect with each other online.
LinkedIn is a more business oriented networking website where you can get connected with clients and business resources. You can post business news, create groups and write recommendations.
Blogs
If you want to write articles or news posts about your business or industry, a blog is a great way to do this. A blog allows you to be seen as an expert in your field as well as build an online community. Visitors can comment on your posts. Search engines love the fresh content on blogs as well,and can help increase your website traffic if you post regularly. Blogs can be linked in to your website or other websites.
SonicSpider offers a custom blog and feed manager. Other popular blogs are Blogger and Wordpress.
For more information about how Social Media can help your business, or for a Marketing Strategy session with SonicSpider, call us at 619.955.6380 or visit our website at www.sonicspider.com.