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Advertising agencies are here to help you get your company, products and services noticed. They provide you with ways in being able to present your company in your particular industry and become one of the options, if not the number one choice for the consumers in their buying process.

Advertising Agency Branding - How It Works

Advertising agency branding starts with getting to know your company in terms of the industry it is in. It studies the present workings of your company, the quality of products or services you provide, and the buying experience of the customers as well as their satisfaction brought about by what you sell.

One then proceeds with the analysis of your companys situation, in consideration of your customers perception of your company and the products and services you provide. This can be done through research methods or by interviews and surveys.

An advertising agency then comes up with a plan - to address the weak points in your companys image and to highlight the distinct advantage your companys products can offer to the buyer.

The Usual Approach of Advertising Agency Branding

There are specific approaches the advertising agency will employ in order to get your products noticed and to influence the buyers to pick yours over the others. Below are just examples on how advertising agency branding may be done.

The use of catchy phrases - Advertising agency branding can provide you with this service so that your product will be associated with catchy words, and becomes easier for consumers to remember.

The use of characters - Associating your companys products with characters that people can relate to, will do well on making your product stand-out in the customers minds.

There are still many other methods of capturing that element that sets your products apart from your competitors. The idea is for the advertising agency to be creative enough to come up with the appropriate appeal of your products, and show it to the world in good taste.

Influence Your Customers Perception and Feeling

One should note that the message delivered by the companys ad campaign should be done just right so as to evoke the positive emotions and perceptions of the consumers. One should ensure that the consumers would be able to relate with the messages of these campaigns.

The ad campaign should consider the specific market your company is targeting. The substance and message of the campaign should be focused and concentrated on that specific buying market.

Remember that advertising agency branding should not only be successful in making your products visible in the market, but it should also induce the consumers to buy - and more so, make them loyal to the brand they now trust.

T J Madigan has been established in online business since 1998 and is director of a number of successful online projects one of which is http://articles.net.au your best source for FREE and private label articles.

I’ll do my best in this column to serve up some information that old hands and newcomers alike can take away that I hope will make the next few moments of your time well spent.

If you’re brand new to digital signage, struggling to understand where it fits into the communications landscape, here are five basic principles that will help you put digital signage into context -whether you’re thinking about using it to greet visitors in your company’s lobby or influence shoppers to make a purchase.

* Dynamic messaging: Digital signage transforms dull, static signs into a dynamic mix of video, graphics, text and animation that can communicate and influence viewers in ways more akin to television than a printed placard.

* Easily changed: Unlike signs that have to be reprinted to update messaging, digital signage text and graphics can be changed in a matter of moments to reflect the exact messaging that’s needed at any given moment.

* Scheduled to maximize impact: Because it’s easy to update digital signs, they can playback messaging needed to address an audience that changes throughout the day. For example, a digital sign outside a hotel restaurant can entice early risers to visit for breakfast in the morning, transition to lunch fare in the afternoon, display an elegantly appointed table with dinner specials in the late afternoon, and promote featured music acts that will appear in the lounge after dinner.

* Comfort and credibility: The very fact that digital signage relies on LCD and plasma panels and even CRTs for display -just like the one’s in the living rooms of most U.S. households- and that it can present messaging every bit as appealing as anything on television, imparts a degree of credibility to the medium that’s easy to take for granted but difficult for other new media to attain.

* Linear and interactive playback: Digital signage can be used to playback a series of pieces of linear content -that with a beginning, middle and end- as well as stand in for digital kiosks that give users access to branching interactive content to meet their needs. The same digital sign can do double duty in a hybrid application to attract an audience with linear content and deliver specific content in interactive mode at the touch of a screen.

For the old hands, here are five factoids about digital signage that are worth considering:

* Fine Art: With so much attention focused on the commercial aspect of digital signage, it would be easy to miss the fact that large flat panel plasma displays are currently being used as a digital canvass for the a series of 30 high definition video portraits at New York’s Phillips de Pury and Paula Cooper galleries and at the Ace Gallery in Los Angeles. The exhibit, VOOM PORTRAITS by ROBERT WILSON, underscores how the technology at the heart of digital signs is becoming increasingly common.

* Changing media markets: On their own, digital signage networks are becoming a significant advertising medium. Well-positioned to complement the skyrocketing online advertising market, which is expected to grow 35 percent this year, digital signage networks are coming into their own as a viable advertising medium.

* Proximity sensing: As hybrid interactive digital signs increasingly stand in for digital kiosks, the
need to recognize the presence of viewers grows. Not only can such knowledge automatically launch a presentation, it also can control audio volume to prevent audio from closely spaced signs from competing with one another and creating an audio mess. Proximity sensors that easily interface with interactive digital signs can take control and create order from what otherwise would be chaos.

* Projector alternative: New technologies that allow projected images to be clearly seen on screens mounted in full daylight are emerging. Coupled with new technology that corrects for geometric distortion of projected images from oddly placed projectors, the new screen technology opens new opportunities for projectors to be used in digital signage applications.

* Flatter all the time: For the first time, flat panel displays have surpassed CRT-based televisions in consumer sales. Not only does that mean economies of scale will continue to make digital signage displays less expensive, it also means digital signage will continue to blend easily into the media landscape.

There you have it, five things you need to know about digital signage and five things you may not have known. Whether you’re an old hand or newcomer, I hope it was time well spent. If you have a digital signage topic that you would like me to research and write on, please provide feedback.

David Little is a digital signage authority with 20 years of experience helping professionals use technology to more effectively communicate their messages. Keywest Technology specializes in technology for digital signage. Visit http://www.keywesttechnology.com and expand your marketing horizons.

Every successful entrepreneur knows that the most important part of any business plan is the marketing strategy. Too many would-be business owners get so caught up in product development that they overlook the importance of how that product is going to get into the hands of consumers. The question investors ask budding business owners is what’s your distribution? which is a way of asking how will you market this?

In the 21st century we have so many different means of communication available to us that it is overwhelming at times to try to choose which medium will best serve your business. People are hit by marketing messages 24/7 and tune out over 95% of what they see or hear. More money is wasted on bad marketing strategies than almost any other part of business, so for young start-ups, it’s best to test with free marketing methods.

One free method of marketing is to affiliate yourself with a business network such as your local chamber of commerce. When there are events, you can share your business cards and brochures with all the other members present. They in turn will likely give you their information, but you may be just what one of these people is looking for or find a partner to joint venture with that will give you leverage to get more exposure for your product.

A second free method of marketing is to write and submit press releases. The internet has made this method so easy, cheap, and fast that offline papers often turn to the online databases to find news. The announcement of your new product and how it solves a problem is definitely newsworthy. Never write them to sound like commercials, it should always sound like news or it won’t get published. Once you’ve written it, you can send it to any of the many online press publication sites, such as OpenPR.com.

Free marketing method number three is to participate in online forums and utilize your signature line to talk about your business. Never openly talk about your business in a forum unless it’s to directly answer somebody else’s question, and never post garbage like ‘me too’ just to get your signature seen in a thread. Contribute good quality and choose a forum that interests potential clients so you’ll know you’ve got a winner.

A fourth and one of the best ways to market for free, is to simply offer some free incentive for people to try your product. This can be entry into drawings for hot prizes, gifts that bear your company logo or message of some sort, free memberships, consultations, information, or bonus additional products with purchase.

Giving things away for free tends to enhance the perceived value of what you offer while at the same time winning the trust of your clients. As people see your interest in delivering real benefits and not just taking their money, you will see more buyers and more frequent action from the same buyers.

Marketing doesn’t have to cost big money, often the best solutions are very inexpensive. Test your strategies for free as often as you can until you are sure of the market’s response, so that once you know how much it costs you to get a buyer you can spend that amount over and over while always gaining more and more profits.

Tyler Ellison is a successful entrepreneur who teaches automated marketing strategies at his site http://www.youcanworkthenet.com and encourages others to join the community at http://www.littleguyco-op.com .

Since hiring a high-powered public relations firm is not in the cards for most business owners, coming up with creative ways to market on a budget is an essential part of any business plan. Your marketing efforts will grease the wheels of your business and get it moving in the right direction. Don’t be intimidated by the hype surrounding the extravagant advertising budgets during the Super Bowl. Not everyone needs to spend millions for a thirty second ad. There are plenty of cheap and effective ways to get your name out there and get your products in the hands of customers.

Don’t Let Your Marketing Efforts Fall on Deaf Ears
Quantity is not quality in the marketing world. Believe it or not, sending out advertisements to everyone in the United States is not a cost effective way to spend your marketing dollars. It is a waste of your time and money to advertise to people you know won’t be interested in your product.

Why would a dating service targeting 20-35 year olds living in the Pacific Northwest send a promotional coupon to a ninety-eight year old in Texas? Explore your customer base and figure out where you fit.

There are numerous ways to identify your target market. You will likely have an idea of the type of customer you want to attract from the get-go. It is just a matter of reaching those customers and seeing if they are truly interested in your product.

Don’t go wasting half your marketing budget on your quest to find your target market. If you think your customers will be active adults fond of the outdoors, you might choose to visit local nature societies or park reserves in order to see if that group really likes your product. Instead of wasting time surveying thousands of people, go straight to the source. Find your niche and stay there.

Creating a Marketing Plan Within Your Budget
Now that you know who you are marketing to, you’ll have to figure out how to do it. The “how” will be determined by your budget. Begin by asking yourself several simple questions:

-How much money can I spend on marketing?
-What type of advertising do I want to do?
-Where should I do this advertising?

While it is impossible to accurately foresee where you will want to spend your marketing money for the next year, you should be able to make some rough estimates. It can be helpful to research some of your potential competitors to see where their ad dollars end up. It is always good to learn from other people’s flops. If you identify a certain ad campaign as ineffective, you’ve already saved money by avoiding the same mistake.

Cost Effective Ways to Market Your Business
Creativity is the key to any marketing plan. A creative home video featuring your business may find greater fame on YouTube.com than any television advertisement ever will. Not only is that free, it is effective.

The Internet has opened a whole new world of marketing opportunities, many of them free of charge. Both blogs and public forums have become a great way for business owners to connect with customers on a personal level. This is not about pitching potential customers; it’s about sharing your opinion and having a conversation. Such a medium can be especially advantageous in establishing yourself as an expert in your field.

Article marketing has become another increasingly popular means through which companies market their products. This process requires you to write informative articles relating to the your industry. Once you’ve written a batch of articles, they can be submitted to article databases and then distributed to websites throughout the Internet. Each and every one of those articles will have links going directly to your company’s website. That is free publicity at its best!

Maximizing a budget for a new business is never easy. When you identify your target market, create a marketing plan, and seek out marketing opportunities within your budget, you set yourself up to see sales climb.

Roger Haumann owns a drywall contracting business by day and runs the blog http://www.getarush.blogspot.com by night. Roger is also a frequent contributor to http://www.articlemarketer.com, an online article distribution service.

Out-of-home advertising -the nice-sounding term for all types of advertising consumed away from home, including digital signage- is likely to become an even more important component of the advertising landscape with this week’s announcement that Clear Channel Outdoor Holdings will roll out digital billboards in four more cities: Akron, OH, Columbus, OH, Memphis, TN, and Wichita, KS.

Making up the digital billboard network in each city are:
* Memphis: five 14-foot-by-48-foot digital displays;
* Akron: six 14-foot-by-48-foot digital displays;
* Wichita: six 12-foot-by-24-foot digital displays;
* Columbus: six 12-foot-by-24-foot digital displays.

While the size of Clear Channel Outdoor’s displays and its ongoing commitment to building digital billboards networks are impressive, what’s more impressive is the flexibility the new medium brings to the advertising community. The company plans to rotate advertising copy on each network display in an eight-second loop, totaling a minimum of 1,250 advertising spots every day!

Compare that staggering number to the paltry 23 advertising messages the signs would have carried for weeks or even months if they had been made of paper and ink.

What’s clear from the Clear Channel Outdoors example is the dramatic impact technology is having on the way advertisers can communicate their unique marketing messages to people away from home.

The same is true of indoor digital signage networks. They combine the appeal of television -graphics, text, animation, sound and video- with a growing presence in retail stores, malls and other venues where consumers go to shop. Perhaps even more important, just like the Clear Channel digital billboards, the messaging on digital signage networks can change frequently -even more than a thousand times per day if required.

The flexibility to update messaging easily throughout the day is huge in retail. Consider only a few examples. First, many large retail stores spend seemingly countless hours changing thousands of printed signs in various departments to keep their promotional and marketing messages in line with their retail goals. Digital signage can slash the time spent on this activity. Second, updating or replacing signs at different times of the day to match the changing demographics and desires of patrons is at best difficult. Imagine a cafe in a mall that must post its specials on a placard outside its entrance three times per day -once for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Now extend that concept to other retailers in the same mall that would like to target their messaging to seniors in the morning, students after school and families in the evening. With printed signs, such day parting is nearly impossible. But with digital signage, day parting marketing messages is simple and fast. Third, consider ROI. Traditional signs do not lend themselves to advertising support in a retail setting. Digital signs do, and best of all because they’re easy to change, advertising messages can be sold again and again.

There’s one other important component of Clear Channel Outdoor’s announcement that relates to indoor digital signage networks. The four newly announced cities join deployments in Chicago, Boston, Cleveland, Las Vegas and Minneapolis/St. Paul. In total, the company intends to roll out networked digital billboards in at least 100 markets by the end of this year.

How long will it be before Clear Channel Outdoor’s parent company, which owns or operates 40 TV stations throughout the country, begins combining the sale of commercial TV time with the sale of networked digital billboard ads? What sorts of economies of scale and sales synergies would that type of approach bring?

In the indoor digital signage areas, how long will it be before competing, fractured digital signage networks coalesce into a unified market that can be sold in the same way? Just forward this column to Google. Given what they’ve been up to in the online, radio and television ad markets, they might just be the ones to pull it off.

David Little is a digital signage authority with 20 years of experience helping professionals use technology to more effectively communicate their messages. Keywest Technology specializes in technology for digital signage. Visit http://www.keywesttechnology.com and expand your marketing horizons.

In an era in which labels are practically attached to anything, representing your business by a trademark can be best embodied by a well chosen blank label, which you can personalize according to your own necessities and wishes.

Whether you need a label for advertising purposes or simply for legal means, it is very important that you choose the proper label for your domain, or, if necessary, design your own by using a blank laser label. Also, it could be useful to know that labels can be obtained as a result of purchasing a template compatible with world wide recognized Office programs.

Labels (made by the company and sold everywhere) are very easy to use for companies because they provide a wide range of models and standard text-based tags that can later be printed either on simple paper sheets or on personalized letter headed paper. Furthermore, the above branded labels, and other, blank labels for self-printing are all self-adhesive, which reduces the time spent on applying such labels to the required documentation or products. If you require special postal coding of your outbound mail, what better way than to affix a self-adhesive blank laser label.

If your business requires a permanent supply of labels, you may purchase special software, which allows you to print labels at any time and place, without having to wait for the manufacturers to produce them for you. Naturally, there is a simple package that can be downloaded for free, but if you need a more complex solution, purchasing a copmpany software package will give you the chance of controlling your output and creating only the necessary number of labels, instead of having to place a minimum order that results in you having more labels than you need at a given time.

Blank laser labels are without doubt the proper choice for any company looking to impose their brand, and that require a flexuous demand of labels. This means that printing companies for example, due to their field of activity, can often find themselves in the position of working with labels that contain different and original text and in no case standard mottos. For them, blank laser labels appear to be the best solution for two reasons.

Firstly, blank laser labels are compatible with any printer, which makes them easy to use and non-dependent on any specific utensils. Secondly, blank laser labels can be purchased in stock, with large quantities directly from the producers and with significant money saving incentives.

Accordingly, ideal for mailings and company tags blank laser labels can be seen as one of the most effective office supplies that can make your company stand apart from your competitors. And if you choose to process these labels or just hand the work to manufacturers or associate offices, there can be no doubt time will be saved, the results will improve, and your bottom line will benefit in the long run.

For more information about Avery labels or other blank laser labels, or to search our online catalog, please visit ABB Labels online at http://www.abblabels.com/

A display panel can be SD, or standard definition, ED, or enhanced definition, or HD, high definition. Displays are made up of individual picture elements, called pixels. Basically, the idea is the more pixels, the higher the resolution of an image. Thus, an SD display with a pixel count of 704 (horizontal) x 480 vertical) has less resolution than an ED display with 852 x 480 pixels. HD displays, which have even more pixels and are at the top of the resolution food chain for displays, come in three flavors: 720p, 1080i and 1080p. (More on the “i” and the “p” in a moment.)

A 720p HD display has 1280 pixels (horizontal) by 720 (vertical); 1080i and 1080p displays have 1920 pixels by 1080 pixels, or more than 2 million individual picture elements. The letters “i” and “p” stand for interlaced and progressive, respectively. Interlaced displays, like ordinary TV sets and 1080i HDTVs, paint individual lines of pixels back and forth top to bottom across the display on the odd numbered lines (in HDTVs those are 1, 3, 5…1079) first and then the evens (2, 4, 6…1080) before beginning the process over and over. Taken together the odd numbered line “field” and the even numbered line field create one “frame,” or complete still image. There are 30 such frames displayed per second.

Progressive displays, like computer monitors and 1080p HDTVs, display lines sequentially (1, 2, 3… 1080) before beginning the process again. These 1080p HD displays paint 60 new still images on the screen every second. With twice the frame rate (60 versus 30),1080p demands twice the amount of data as 1080i.

That difference in frame rates means different things to different parties interested in high definition. To marketers using an HD as the display technology in a digital signage network, 1080p is the top-of-the-line image quality they can expect to achieve for the foreseeable future. If the message they are communicating requires the utmost resolution, 1080p may be the right choice. However, 1080p displays are more expensive and there will be a price to pay in terms of content storage required to drive that messaging.

To broadcasters who must work within the law administered by the FCC for transmission of HD, 1080p is too much. Simply given what they must work with, 1080p is beyond their capacity to deliver. Thus, 1080i and 720p are the broadcast HD formats.

To movie studios wishing to distribute their films in the highest display format available in the home, 1080p is the answer. Much of the buzz over Blu-ray and HD-DVD optical discs is in part about the ability of the competing formats to deliver superb image quality. Those formats -and their use of a blue frequency laser with a shorter wavelength that can write more data per area of storage- were designed to be able to write the all of the 1080p data to disk that’s needed to playback a full-length movie plus bonus material.

But here’s the most important party in the 1080p HD resolution equation: the audience. Whether you’re a digital signage marketer, a broadcaster or a movie studio, you are faced with same question: How do I affordably deliver the level of quality to my audience that satisfies my desired communications goal? In other words, how much resolution is enough for the communications task at hand?

Only you can answer that question. To illustrate how subjective the answer is, consider this: ABC, ESPN, Fox and My Network TV rely on 720p, or 720 progressive lines, for HD service while NBC, CBS and PBS rely on 1080i. Perhaps before you decide which level of HD resolution is most appropriate for your high definition digital signage network, you should flip between ESPN’s “Sportscenter HD” (720p), “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” (1080i) and “March of the Penguins” (1080p) playing back from an HD-DVD player or “Mr. & Mrs. Smith” (1080p) from a Blu-ray player on your 1080p display. You may be surprised by what you observe.

David Little is a digital signage authority with 20 years of experience helping professionals use technology to more effectively communicate their messages. Keywest Technology specializes in technology for digital signage. Visit http://www.keywesttechnology.com and expand your marketing horizons.

You’ve probably heard the old saying - I know that half of my advertising dollars are wasted, if I only knew which half! Although it’s not possible to know all the factors that go into effective advertising, there are a few elements that are crucial to an ad campaign that is profitable. If you strive to achieve as many of the following 7 factors as possible, you can be confident that you’ll have a winning campaign.

1) Choose an appropriate medium to convey your message. This is so obvious, but you’d be amazed at how many people don’t use common sense when buying media. If you’re trying to reach a 14 year old, don’t buy an ad in the daily paper - buy the radio station that plays hip hop music! Try to target your advertising as much as possible. Think about the person you’re trying to reach with your message. The more you know about that person, the easier this will be.

If you’re selling clothing to working women, buying TV is probably not a good idea. They’re probably so busy doing household chores and taking kids to various activities, they probably don’t have time to watch much TV. But billboards and radio are great because she’s probably on the road a lot and those media fit for that audience.

2) Don’t believe that everyone uses media the way you or your spouse does. Just because you don’t like a certain program on TV doesn’t mean that your potential customer doesn’t like it - they may be big fans and never miss an episode.

Don’t assume that everyone reads the newspaper because everyone you know does. Ask for information about the medium’s audience - let your rep show you exactly who is watching/reading/listening/driving by/surfing their medium.

3) Don’t judge the price of the ad by the dollar amount alone. Just because an ad is expensive doesn’t mean it isn’t a good buy - and the opposite is true also. If an ad is cheap, but no one reads or sees it, it’s worthless to you. If an ad is reaching tens of thousands of people for $1,000, it might be a good buy if those are the people who are in the market for your product.

Try to gauge the real value of an ad by the cost per thousand or cost per rating point (for TV, radio & cable). If you’re not familiar with those terms, ask your ad rep - they will be happy to fill you in. (And if they aren’t, find a new rep.)

4) Develop a relationship with your customers and prospects. This is another thing that should be obvious, but very few companies actually do this. Proctor and Gamble has found that this is what makes them money. And it makes sense. If people trust your brand and feel that they know your company, they’re far more likely to buy your products. This is actually easier to do as a smaller business than a large one - and many local businesses have done this for years.

It may be schmaltzy, but when the local furniture store owner is on camera for all his TV commercials, people develop a relationship of sorts with him or her. They feel like they know that business. Anytime you can link a personality - even if it’s not a celebrity - to a business, that makes that business stand out. This is an important element that there’s not nearly enough room to cover - so think this one through for your business and come up with ways (and they can be very simple) to develop a relationship with your customers and prospects. An email newsletter is a simple, cheap and very effective way to do this, by the way.

5) Have a hook. Give people something that makes them remember you. Big companies spend millions on this - and for a good reason - it sells stuff. Whatever you do, don’t say “for the best in service and quality” - no one will believe you! If you want to convey that message, have one of your customers give a testimonial on camera - have them describe how you provided them with great service and quality. Give details.

A hook needs to be simple, memorable and if possible, fun or heartwarming. The Taco Bell Chihuahua is a good example - the Pillsbury Doughboy is another one. Do something different and let people know about it. Give them a reason to choose your company over your competitors.

6) Be relevant. Talk to your prospects in your advertising - let them know that you feel their pain and are going to help them make it go away. If you’re talking about something they can’t relate to, they’ll ignore you. There are way too many advertising messages in the world today - and people have learned to tune them out unless they click with something that is important to them. You know how this works - you do the same thing.

If you’re sick of how your car is nickel & dimming you lately, you suddenly are much more aware of ads for cars. Find out why people buy your product and talk about how you will give that to them. It’s really pretty simple - but an overwhelming majority of businesses totally miss this.

7) Make sure you know what you’re trying to get your prospect to do. Do you want them to come to your store and buy a specific product? Or do you want them to call your business to get an estimate on a project so your sales person can close the sale in person? The more specific you are in your call to action (please make sure to include one!), the more likely your audience will do what you want them to do.

All of the elements that go into your advertising - the media, the creative, the copywriting, the call to action - create a synergistic result. The more focused you are with any of those elements, the better your results will be. It’s always crucial to measure your ad results. Determine what you want to achieve and include devices that will allow you to determine whether or not you achieved your goal. Then you can tweak results from there.

Kevin Sinclair is the publisher and editor of Be Successful News, a site that provides information and articles on how to succeed in your own home or small business. http://www.besuccessfulnews.com/

Local search is all the rage. At the 2007 Search Engine Strategies event in New York City there were presentations and exhibitors touting the importance of local search strategies and tactics.

It’s like the presenters and exhibitors just discovered that people are really mostly interested in finding products and services nearby.

I guess what’s really going on is that finally technology, or its application, has caught up with what people really want Internet search to do for them.

I use Internet search for everything - especially local! We haven’t had a copy of the Yellow Pages (or white pages) in our apartment since we got high-speed access.

We Google directions to the Gap across town. If a movie is playing in Brooklyn we Google directions to the theater and buy the tickets online - so we can get in after we make the trek.

As a user we know all we need to know about local search. We type in what we want and where we want to get it and bingo - here it is and a map’s included. It just doesn’t get any better than that.

So, what’s the big deal for business owners when it comes to local search in 2007?

It’s leveling the field - putting the Main Street Companies we love doing business with right up there with their big box rivals.

How’s that possible you ask? Well, here are three simple ways to maximize your over all search results using a local search focus.

Differentiation:
What makes your company different? What are the local aspects of your business? That’s how you differentiate yourself from your competitors. Local search ads and placement provide the opportunity.

Would you rather eat spaghetti at a local franchise of a national chain or a locally owned Italian restaurant that’s supported the community since 1963 - who supplies pizza for the area football team parents night and whose grand daughter won the state’s citizenship award competition?

We do business with our friends. Local search provides us with the information we need to do so.

Reach Buyers When They’re Ready To Buy:
Let’s say I was looking for a health club membership to begin addressing my 2004 New Year’s resolution. OK, so I’ve put it off a bit - but now I may be ready, so what’s my number one criterion?

Location. It has to be as close to me as possible - so I’ll be more likely to show up.

I may have been introduced to a certain company via their TV commercials. In our many walks around the various communities in New York I may have passed dozens of their health clubs. I may even know people who have a membership at one of them and swear by it.

But if I’m going to join one - it has to be in my neighborhood.

So I go online, do a local search, and find that they have a brand new heath club only a few blocks away. They even have printable coupons for various membership types. I’m doomed - my last really good excuse is gone.

Leverage All Your Touch Points
If your online goal is to simply drive people physically into your place of business you can provide them with directions to your place, a map, when you’re open, etc. with your local search strategy.

Perhaps more importantly you can offer your customers additional options for doing business with you - which they did not know about.

Let’s say you sell cement to contractors and homeowners. Your customers get it delivered to the job site or in their driveway - most of the time. No one ever comes by, even though you have people working there twelve hours a day seven days a week.

Local search can be used to tell people that you’re open in case they need to pick up a few extra bags of Quickrete over the weekend. Or they can place an order online or on your 24 hour a day voicemail for next day delivery.

Effective local search tactics reaches local searchers when they are ready to buy - with every way that it is possible for them to buy from you.

At the Search Engine Strategies event the experts told us to adopt a search marketing strategy that has global reach (hey, you never know), regional implications, and connects with our local buying audience.

How is that possible? Let’s take a top down look.

National Campaign:
For most companies this is best left to their manufacturers. Let General Motors create the buzz, show the new models, pitch the extraordinary value, and the environmental friendliness of their vehicles.

Let them do national TV and spend a bazillion dollars on search engine optimization, just push them to link to your company while they’re at it. Hey, it’s their brand; so let them do the branding.

You spend your money and energy with actions that result in sales for you.

Expanded regional Area Keyword Search:
There is an Auto Mall on I71 North of Cincinnati. I bet the dealers there sell most of their vehicles to folks who live north of downtown all the way up maybe 25 to 40 miles north of where the Mall is located.

People living a little farther north of that line may turn right when they get on I71 and head toward Columbus. People south of downtown Cincinnati cross the bridge into Northern Kentucky. On the east side of Cincinnati there is at least one huge Auto Mall siphoning off potential business as well.

Out of area local search can target these buyers telling them to come by your dealership for a comparison before they buy. If they do you guarantee to make it worth their time.

Tell them how long it will take on I275 from different parts of the metro area. And if they buy a new vehicle you’ll give them an extra $500 off if they live more than so many miles away. You get the idea.

What’s it worth to your business to increase your traditional marketing area by another 25 miles in every direction?

Local Relevance Promotions:
Don’t forget the importance of dominating the market you’re already in. A local search marketing strategy will help you solidify your base with a reminder that you’re still there.

As a local business owner you are sought out by every community endeavor for your support. Local search provides an opportunity improve on your local relevance - why people should support your business. Local search gives you a chance to remind people of your commitment to them.

As with the Italian restaurant - I’ll pay more money for new tires if given the chance to buy them from the nice people who sent the local high school band to New Orleans to play in the Sugar Bowl parade - even if it was a decade ago.

Compare that to saving a few bucks from a giant store where I am just a number and actually had to be there before 10am to qualify for the special price anyway.

Here are three things to keep in mind when considering your local search marketing strategy.

What do you really want?
How far can you haul gravel and still make money? How far can your service technicians travel and still at least break even? Do you simply want to dominate your traditional selling area or do you see local search as a way to gradually and systematically expand you company into a wider and wider area? Knowing this will help you when it comes to budgeting the resources required.

Who’s willing to help you?
Will you highly respected manufacturer link to you in a way that helps raise your status with the search engines? Or will other companies join you in an effort to build your presence online collectively? Consider the Auto Mall - there must be a dozen of more dealerships all in one place. Working together with ad buys and pooling resources to hire SEO experts will benefit them all.

What’s your budget?
Where’s the money going to come from - your major distributors, your manufacturer, our your wallet? What’s your stomach for online advertising? Do you have the people and the interest to do pay for performance ads? Or do you feel more comfortable with the idea of doing whatever SEO you can do easily, buy ads on a fixed rate basis like in the Yellow pages - and move on?

What it all boils down to is what’s important to you.

For some maybe reading this article is enough. When they do whatever marketing and/or advertising they do in the future they’ll factor some of these thoughts into their decisions.

Others will want to know more, this will have opened their eyes to some real possibilities they are missing - stuff they want to be doing before their competitors start doing them.

If that’s you, visit our directory of over 300 search engine marketing and optimization articles at http://www.ibizresources.com/seo_articles/index.html Wayne Messick’s web site http://www.iBizResources.com offers business owners a wealth of free information and business insights.

As the owner of a small website, I know how easy it is to get lost in the mix. Sometimes you just want to throw your hands in the air and say, “I give up! Pass me a margarita.”

But before you go reaching for the tequila and salt, let me tell you something. It’s not as hard as you think to get links, get noticed and start actually “doing business” with your online business. That’s the idea after all, right?

Here’s how I approach the problem: I write two or three short 500-800 word articles a week about my business, and then I submit them using an online submission service. The service is budget-friendly, super-easy to use and extremely effective. After just two days, I looked for my article and it was posted on more than 50 websites.

That means each of those sites contains a link back to my site, and more inbound links means — you guessed it — better search engine results positioning. Before I knew it, I was getting more than 200 hits a day on my site. “Unbelievable!” I thought, but it was true.

Here’s the idea. You write a few short articles each week — or as many as you can churn out, the more the merrier — and submit them either using a service or software you’ve purchased that serves this purpose. (Psst! Guess what? A service is a thousand times easier.)

You can select a category for your article, such as Business, Fashion, Marketing, etc. and then select subcategories that will pin your article to even more specific needs if you like. The benefit to categorizing your article is that it will show up in front of people who are looking for your product, service or website. If you write about Children’s Fashions and you turn up in a newsletter about lawn care, people aren’t going to read your article or click on your link.

The way you choose to submit your articles is also important. Software is an option, but I don’t like it because it is quickly (some would argue immediately) outdated, clunky and hard to use. First you have to install it, then you have to figure out how each aspect of the program works, then you have to write your articles — the fact is, most people aren’t going to bother once they’ve got the thing installed.

The thing I love about online submission services is that they do the heavy-lifting for you. All you have to do is write your articles and submit them, and they do the rest. Different services have different features, of course, and you should do the research to see which one is right for your needs.

iSnare is one service that offers “distribution credits” to its authors. Submission is free, but in order to have your article distributed, you must purchase these credits. It’s $10 for five credits, $18 for 12, $38 for 28 and so on. They distribute articles to more than 150 article email lists and over 40,000 publishers, plus hundreds of article sites. They have good reviews from satisfied customers on their website.

ThePhantomWriters is another option. Be sure to include “the” in the title, because there is another website called PhantomWriters that offers writing services, not article distribution. ThePhantomWriters service operates on a sliding scale. It costs $35 to submit one article, and then the next three are $27.50 each, on down to $20 apiece for 10 articles. This is a little steep for my budget, so I moved on pretty quickly from Phantom.

The service I prefer is Article Marketer. They are very professional and courteous, and they tell me when I have something to fix about an article before it can be distributed. At $79.99 for three months or $239.99 for an annual subscription, I can afford to write as many or as few articles as I want. I get unlimited submissions with my subscription price.

Roger Haumann is a self-employed contractor by day, and blogger by night. He is a regular contributor to http://www.articlemarketer.com, an online article distribution service. Visit http://www.articlemarketer.com/howto.php to learn how to get noticed online.
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