Online Advertising for Dummies

Whether you are checking your email, shopping on a website or just searching for information, online ads are everywhere! A new marketing landscape, Internet offers a new and cheaper advertising space, as compared to traditional spaces like print, television, radio and outdoor advertising. It’s a revolution of sorts and small and home business owners are making most of it.

For a home based start up, online advertising is a potent tool that can maximize visibility, drive traffic to company’s website, up sales and build a solid brand in process. Going to an expensive advertising agency to run your campaign would most definitely burn a hole in your pocket. The good news is you don’t have to do that. Just remember twin mantras of focus on what you want and a strong dose of imagination; and you’ll be on your way.

Take guesswork out of online advertising

Online advertising is not a function of elaborate guesswork and a myriad of hits and misses. Like traditional offline version, online advertising must also follow some basic rules. Know what you want your advertising to do, where to get it and what to do with it once you have it. Here are some guidelines to get you started.

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1. Define your advertising objective: Shut door, switch off lights, take a deep breath and think why you need to advertise. Clearly define goals you want your advertising program to achieve. Is it generating new leads, increasing number of hits on your website, making your company visible in market place or to increase on/off -line sales? Each goal will have a different advertising path. You can only expect your program to maximize returns, if you know for sure what you want your advertising to do.

2. Decide “where” you want to be seen: It makes a difference to be seen in right places. Like in offline advertising, placement of your ad is very crucial to success. Advertising (Co-advertising for higher benefits) on websites that are most relevant to your line of business would be best place. Also consider top Search Engines, Online Yellow pages, Service Provider directories and large sites or networks. Explore trade –specific websites for a more focused audience.

3. Tailor message for your target audience: when you want caveman to listen, beat your chest! Craft your message to appeal to target audience. Your message for a visitor on a trade forum’s website would be different from what you say to guy clicking on your ad on a home business site. The trick here is to align your message to mindset of your audience. Equally important is that message should convey promotional goals your advertising desires to accomplish. So if you are selling ice to an Eskimo shopping in an Internet mall, don’t forget to mention discount on your season sale!
   
   

A Free articles marketing campaign is an investment that requires patience

One of greatest causes for failure in any marketing campaign, is lack of patience so many entrepreneurs display.

In a way it is not really surprising that most of us are not patient. The net is full of instant-fix solutions being advertised all over place. Some are very workable but most of them are simply hype designed to get money out of impatient people’s pockets.

It is also true that any online marketing campaign is supposed to take hold and work almost immediately because of instant nature of net.

However if you intend to use free articles online to promote your business, then let me tell you up front that it will not work instantly.

It will take time for your articles to take hold and gain viral effect of getting re-posted all over net, which is real power of this promotional method.

I recently had a client who was very interested in doing an articles promotion campaign immediately for their web site. They were keen on using my services but started off by writing their own articles and posting them on as many sites as they possibly could. After only a week or two, they had completely lost hope and interest in articles ever generating enough traffic and sales for them.

Naturally I made an effort to present facts to this client, but he had made up his mind. He was convinced after such a short time that articles would not work for him. I felt great pity for them. They had even forgotten so quickly, that it was an article that had made them get in touch with me in first place. Was this not proof enough to them that it worked?