Waitperson and/or Coffee Shop Owner: These folks are in trenches and know more business professionals than you may know. Coffee shops play as much a role in business as Board rooms. Regular customers often view owners and employees as familiar friends. Select a busy coffee shop and frequent it regularly. Establish a friendly rapport with boss and staff so that they know you well. As a regular, you'll benefit if they know about your business as well as fact that you write. Be personable, carry business cards and tip generously... and don't be surprised! You can't buy exposure for price of a cup of coffee but you can gain recognition by genuinely interacting with others publicly. Never dismiss potential of a contact who works in any service industry.

Charities/Community Service Organizations: While it's quicker and easier to write a check, taking your donation to next level can create a definite presence for you. Since most of these groups are nonprofit offer to contribute a free article. Try one of these article ideas: a piece about group's local efforts, a press release about a new fundraising effort or offer to write a regular column that covers positive impact of group's work from viewpoint of a business professional.

Professional Organizations: You pay your annual membership fee but attend few meetings and/or functions. Sure there's prestige with membership but anyone bearing proper credentials can join. Treat your membership as an investment, a potentially profitable one by being active within organization. Out of sight is typically out of mind, so make sure to let people see you regularly. Be first one to volunteer your business expertise and/or writing services for any projects.

Adjust your focus to potential rather than immediate and don't forget to look in your own backyard for business contacts and opportunities. As your own local awareness increases you will receive reciprocating professional recognition. It's just a matter of fine-tuning your perspective.

(c) 2004, Davis Virtual Assistance. All rights in all media reserved. Right to publish this article is granted provided article and by-line are reprinted intact.

6. Do you know who your on-line competitors are? If you don’t, go to any search engine, enter a few keywords related to your industry and see who appears on first page. Visit a few of them. What is their message? What do you see as their strengths and weaknesses.? What do you like or dislike about their sites? How could you make your offering more attractive or enticing?

7. Can you be competitive? Knowing what your competitors are offering, can you realistically expect to compete with them, especially when it comes to pricing? Internet inquiries generally come from individuals looking for a deal so they are price sensitive. Do your competitors actual provide pricing or to they ask visitors to make an on-line inquiry or to call for a quote? If you are in a service related business, what are you going to have to do to compel visitors to act once they visit your site? What can you do to separate you from your on-line competition?

8. How unique is your product and/or service? Do you have a unique offering, or are you in a highly competitive industry? Obviously, more unique your offering, easier it is going to be to get exposure and greater your potential is going to be for success.

9. How are you going to promote your site? One of greatest misconceptions in e-commerce is notion that to succeed all one has to do to is submit a site to search engines. This, unfortunately, is full extent of marketing for far too many web sites and rarely gets job done.

One of primary considerations when it comes to search engine placement is popularity. The more sites linking or referencing your site, higher page rank it will earn. It is fairly inexpensive to get a link on a wide variety of permanent directories, but it takes more than directory links to significantly increase a site’s popularity. If you or your webmaster don’t take time to negotiate link exchanges with non-directory related sites, especially those who have high rankings, you are not likely to gain favorable positioning in any but most insignificant search engines. 10. What have you budgeted for promotion? If you cannot afford to promote your site, you might as well forget spending money on its development. To get a quick idea what it might costs to promote your product or service on line using a pay-for-performance advertising program, visit Overture.com again. Enter one of your industry related keywords in Overture’s internet search window on company’s home page.

When results appear, click on “View Advertiser’s Max Bids” link that appears to top and right. The highest bidder wins top sponsored position on Yahoo, MSN, CNN, Alta Vista, InfoSpace, Overture and a dozen or more minor search engines. The top three sponsored listings will appear above normal search results at top of these search engines whenever surfer uses keywords or keyword phrases advertiser has bid on.

These questions are not all inclusive, but they do provide food for thought. Hopefully, they will help those interested in establishing a web presence a better idea of what will be needed to achieve a predictable degree of success as well as a reasonable return on investment.

If you would like more information, visit http://www.websitetutoring.com.