Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

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Tracy Barnhart, Owner
Giverny, Inc. / Mini Me Geology
http://www.GivernyOnline.com
http://www.MiniMeGeology.com

The most important thing for any online business is "THE CONTENT"; it doesn`t matter how much social networking, linking building you do, in the end it comes down to "DID YOU CONVINCE THE READER" or in this case the customer.
You can spend hours, and weeks building your links but if the content is not there, you`re customers will visit but they will leave, just as fast as it took them to click on your Link AD.

Make sure your web site`s content is clean, and convincing, remember that the more information you offer a customer the easier it is to convince them. For example: if you`re selling cookies, you might want to create a nutrition guide with the ingredients. The KEY is to educate your customers even it it`s "only a cookie".

BUT! before you create the perfect content make sure that your web site is visible and accessible even if it`s through an IPHONE. 
Make sure your site is coded correctly. Add the right keywords "relevant to your topic.
Submit your web site to search engines every 21 or 31 days, create a sitemap, robot.txt file and included in your web site.




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Edgar Monroy
Web Developer / Owner / Consultant
When starting your own business the need to "know-how" is greater than money!
http://www.nuevolution.net

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Web Design | Best Beef Jerky | ecommerce articles | Follow vwebworld on Twitter

Disagree on this.  A sitemap should be re-generated and re-submitted whenever new pages or new blog posts are made to a site.  With Google, it`s done in the webmaster tools.  With Yahoo it`s a bit more complex.  I just wrote a blog post about it the other day (link below in my signature) on how to let Yahoo know when you have not only made changes to your site but how what`s needed to set your site in the Yahoo version of Google`s webmaster tools.


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Aaron Wood
CEO
San Diego Dream Weavers
http://www.sddreamweavers.com
awood@sddreamweavers.com

New and improved! Now with blogging goodness!
http://www.sddreamweavers.com/san-diego-seo-marketing-blog/

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Aaron Wood
CEO
San Diego Dream Weavers
http://www.sddreamweavers.com
awood@sddreamweavers.com

New and improved! Now with blogging goodness!
http://www.sddreamweavers.com/san-diego-seo-marketing-blog/

From what we`ve experienced, it`s not the site so much that matters, it`s what you`re doing to market that site---to make it visible. Yes, content matters the most because without attractive, persuasive content and a viable product, who cares? But we`ll assume you have a product (or service). If you don`t have strong content, then that`s first, but I wouldn`t say most important.

In with the content is the optimization---the SEO. But when that`s taken care of, I think the most important thing is to always be "out and about," looking for ways to connect with other people, other sites, directories, and so forth.

Explore different free locations like Squidoo, or Merchant Circle. Look at related blogs and post some comments. Build your own blog, and make it interesting. I`m not a fan of this term, "social networking." I get what it means, but I think it`s too limited. It tends to bog people down in such places as MySpace. I`d rather go back to the old expression, "talking it up."

Roland brings up the other interpretation of the same question, though, when you look at the underlying technology and infrastructure. What`s most important? Having a site that actually runs, and doesn`t crash and burn every few days. :-) But again, we`ll assume you have a site that`s working correctly and a shopping cart that can properly handle transactions.

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Tracy Barnhart, Owner
Giverny, Inc. / Mini Me Geology
http://www.GivernyOnline.com
http://www.MiniMeGeology.com

Tracy,
If you ask me about rocks and minerals, well, the only thing that I know about a rock is that if you get hit with one it hurts. I think it would be a good approach if you were to educate the readers on the various types of rocks and minerals that can be used in a home to decorate. I think that if you creating a blog on "Givernyonline" and then cross-reference your blogs "Linking them to your products" it would help increase your web site`s credibility and visibility.

Now as for SDdreamweavers, blog? Well again, I don`t know how much of it "was written by him or if it was just a copy and paste project that was just modified to make it sound like he wrote it. But the truth is, that I do agree that every time you create a new page you have to edit your sitemap and resubmitted to the search engines. But just like you submit your sitemap, you should get in the practice of doing the same for the page that you just created.

Tracy, if you have tons of information on one site, why not link some articles back to your other web site?
As for CraigL, I didn`t know you were part of Merchant Circle.. Look me up and link up to me. whats your username? so I can look for you?



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Edgar Monroy
Web Developer / Owner / Consultant
When starting your own business the need to "know-how" is greater than money!
http://www.nuevolution.net

Speaking to NuEvolution`s point about educating the customer, let`s go back to a question to ask yourself:
You might say, "I offer rocks."

"To what purpose?" I would ask.

So to me, the most important part of any business, e-commerce or otherwise, is in clearly describing what it is you`re offering. What`s in it for the customer or client?

That`s where content is fundamental. Everything else supports that content, and makes it *easy* for someone to then take you up on your offer.

Hi Tracy,

If you are selling to schools my focus as an internet marketer would be to focus on building strong enough relationships with the school / school websites to encourage them to link back to you.

If you can figure out a creative way to encourage each school (client) to link back to your website you will find ranking well for your keywords a lot easier.  .EDU domain names pull a lot of weight and chances are the school`s domain name has many quality & relevant inbound links (i.e. high PR).

I agree that content is king but used in a creative way it can do wonders.  Try creating a resource section dedicated to further education.  Then encourage schools to link back to that section.  You could spend an entire year performing all the SEO tactics in the world....but getting one quality link from a school (say a university) would probably beat all of that.

Jeff