Business Blogs: Trends, tips, and real-life anecdotes from industry experts.

Running your own business? Looking for new ways to market your products or services online? Then read through The Internet Marketing Checklist for Small Business below, and see if you should be adding a few more tactics to your marketing toolbox.
THE INTERNET MARKETING CHECKLIST FOR SMALL BUSINESS

Website
You have a website, right? If not, create one. [...]

Are you using SEO? In today’s economy, search engine optimization is a cost-effective way to increase online awareness and sales… fast. To find out more about this hot topic, I caught up with one of the gurus of SEO, Heather Lloyd-Martin, President and CEO of SuccessWorks Search Marketing,
http://www.seocopywriting.com. Here’s what she had to say:
Tell [...]

My good buddy and ally in advocacy for small business success, John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing has organized a great webcast happening at 9a Pacific this Wednesday. It’s all about strategies for success in starting and growing a successul business in this environment.
Use this link to find out more and to register.
I will be [...]

It’s Small Business Week. Or, so says the federal gov’t.
Of course, we all know that EVERY week is small business week!
Received this transcript of SBA Administrator Karen Mills’ speech and thought it contained a nugget of information, excerpted here below, that might be of interest to you:
Today, I’m pleased to announce plans to add another [...]

Great site: www.embracethelemon.com
Terrific example of a website that is almost 100% twitter feeds + has great you tube promotion. See their youtube channel.

The Lemon’s Lament

If you wonder what the world will be like in the future, the near future that is, take 8 minutes out of your day to watch this presentation at the recent TED conference, where the best of the best gather to take our world to the next level. This particular innovation is an information tool. [...]

I wonder if products have the same experience people do, that when they meet their match, they feel like they are “home?” I’ll bet the product manager of this doosey has earned his bonus:
Hillshire Farm ham and turkey + reusable Gladware
= Green, Money Saving, The-Big-Corporation-Proves-It-Can-Still-Listen-To-Customers

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What partnerships could you consider in your business?
Example: B&B could supply guests with brunch [...]

Having an online presence is important- but not nearly as important as having a well-designed, easy to navigate website. Unless you’ve got tons of web design experience, chances are you’ll hire a professional to build your site. Most web designers work under contracts, which can vary wildly depending on the designer, the services you need, [...]

StartupNation PR Team Connects you to a Casting Call for an ABC TV show about Entrepreneurs and Inventors!
Do you have the next great moneymaking idea?
StartupNation is working closely with the wonderful folks at Mark Burnett Productions/ABC to help them in their search for entrepreneurs, inventors, businesspersons, dreamers, promoters, creators, innovators, etc. We hope is to [...]

When you consider your business model (which includes your marketing efforts), you generally concentrate on these core components:

Why will people pay you? (money, votes, donations)
What does it cost you to sell your item…margins?
What protects you from competition, price-feature battles?
How will you turn an agnostic audience into loyal customers?

Early on when transactions had no costs, doing [...]