Jumpstart Your Business

Want to make your small business look big? You can learn a lot from Monte Enbysk, a senior editor at Microsoft Office Live, who in his article in Entrepreneur, today, points out these ten things as the answer to what customers are looking for when they visit:

1. How your business is unique
Answer the question “Who are you?” as interestingly and compellingly (and honestly) as possible. This includes writing management bios that mention your expertise, years of experience and any unique attributes or details that may set you apart from others.

2. A clear sense of what your company offers
It’s incredible how many sites you visit and you’re not sure what the company offers. Make it a priority on your home page to provide at least general information about your products and/or services, with links to specifics on a Products page.

Steve Strauss posted this in his column in USA Today. I think that any small business that is not maximizing its Web presence is missing a golden opportunity.

First, let’s make sure we are on the same page. When discussing Web 2.0, what we are talking about is an era where websites are more interactive, engaging, and interesting than before. They are not static, as they were, say, 10 years ago, where all you could do was read. Instead, a Web 2.0 site is one where visitors can engage with you, your business, and your site by:

• Posting comments on your blog, or articles, or chatting in a forum.

• Re-tweeting your content, sharing it on Facebook, or Digging it.

• Watching a video, listening to a podcast, or participating in a webinar.

• Taking a quiz or responding to a poll.

The essence of Web 2.0 is that it is collaborative and interactive. By creating a site that engages and interacts with people, that makes them want to stick around (hence the term “sticky site”) you give people more of a chance to create a connection with your business.
For the complete article please see Maximizing your web presence is key to building your small business

Using the Internet to do business is here to stay and more and more small businesses are having an online presence. You need to think of your business in terms of what it takes to build a more relevant and targeted customer base to meet your market head on rather than how to push your product or service out to unsuspecting prospects. Here are five things to do to set up a web strategy to compete effectively in today’s online world.

1. Build a web site with content that is written around the key phrases that your customers use to find a business or products/services like yours.

Much of today’s small business for profit and not-for-profit application software was written over a decade ago. The million dollar question is: Are these applications still worth running ? Considering all of the technology innovation that has occurred since then, can we expect an application designed and built with yesterday’s technology for yesterday’s business world to fit today’s?

The answer is no.

How will you quickly deploy technology and handle customer support requests for help?
Web applications are being put in use especially where there is a need to interface to customers and even in today’s world of heavy web usage in the home and in business, there are still a lot of users who are not web literate. As we deploy the web into our customer community, we’re forcing users who are unfamiliar with browsers to be very dependent on them. This could be very detrimental to the growth and success of today’s business. Put in place training for both your employees and your customers so that your web applications become easy to use. A help desk may go a long way to helping out this situation.

If you’re building a new web site or renovating an existing one, here are a few tips on hiring a reputable consultant and setting realistic expectations for the project.

1. Make certain that you’re hiring a professional. Check that the are at a minimum listed on the web and have a web site, It is even better if they are a member of one or more professional associations.

Check out this link building strategy. Now if you can follow the beat and use the rhythm while you are linking, you can also be having fun.

Many web designers are making great designs and building great looking pages that are not producing the necessary results. The reason: there is much more to a well performing web site than the look and feel of the site and the different pages. Ask your web designer the following questions and get an answer and then email them to us and we’ll take a quick look and tell you, free of charge, whether they are doing right by you.

Here, in descending order of importance, are the top 7 reasons why your blog may be so popular.

#7 You are very good at PR and know how to get the word out on your blog.

1. Why you should hire a consultant?
With a consultant, you get a one-man team who if you choose well, will be a real professional and will give you individual attention, specialized treatment,