Archive for the ‘Small Business Online Marketing’ Category

51. How the use of Photobucket can benefit a small business

Wednesday, September 26th, 2012

Photobucket allows you to host all your photographs, videos and graphics for free and then share them with customers and colleagues by way of email or social networking sites like MySpace, Twitter and Facebook. A Photobucket account will provide safe storage for thousands of images and videos and allows you to use them in various different ways.

Along with email and social networking sites, your images can be shared with existing and potential clients on any website, blog or forum by simply copying and pasting the relative links.

The free account affords its users up to 500 Megs of storage space and provides for 10 Gigs worth of bandwidth per month. You can create numerous albums and sub-albums in a Photobucket account and reference them with identifying tags. You can choose to share single pictures or an entire album of images and are given the option of keeping any of your content private.

For businesses that require larger amounts of storage space, there is the option to pay a nominal amount per year which will provides a Pro Account with unlimited bandwidth for video viewing and photos. This type of account will also allow for a reasonable amount of business use for sales sites and others like eBay and then charge you for any additional image hosting.

For businesses that use branding merchandise for their clients such as t-shirts, cards and mugs, an account with Photobucket will offer the ability to order this merchandise through them after having been able to edit the images therefore saving on the cost of having to employ a sales site to make any changes.

Pro Account users can also take advantage of provided statistics which will afford an insight into which websites their images are being viewed though and the amount of times every image has been seen. This helps a company determine which web pages are performing well for the company by way of the number of visitors it is receiving as they have been attracted by a certain image.

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Posted in Small business online, Small Business Online Marketing, Website Design | Comments Closed

50. How using Flickr can help your small business

Monday, September 24th, 2012

Flickr is a fantastic way with which to showcase any and all images that represent your business from photographs of products, social company events to trade fairs and much more. By allowing such images to be searchable on Flickr, you can create more exposure for your business.


Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

Traffic can be driven to your own company website as Flickr gives you the option to upload a slideshow you have created onto your own site and for those companies using blog hosts such as Blogger, WordPress, Tumblr and Live Journal there is the option to post images automatically onto your company blog. Both these options will be catching the attention of visitors and showcasing your company immediately.

Integrated with this is the ability to attach a Title, Description and Keyword Tags to every photograph. Whilst Flickr is linked to the search engine Yahoo a well built site on Flickr where photographs have been optimised for search engines and been used creatively for marketing purposes will benefit your business through other search engines such as Google and more.

Flickr has become a fantastic resource for any person or company searching out stock photography for their blog or website. No matter what your company has to write about there will be photographs available to accompany any web content or blog.

If one of your goals as a company is to establish your business as an expert in your field, along with building recognition of your brand and creating working relationships and goodwill, then you may want to consider providing your own company photographs as stock photography via Flickr. Creating a Flickr account consisting of photographs which are interesting and engaging will encourage other people and companies to want to use your photographs.

The fact that you can store and categorise all photographs within a Flickr account has meant that telling your company story visually has never been easier. Your clients and staff can add to your archive by sharing their memories and experiences of your company which in turn can be used to market your business.

Flickr can also be used in conjunction with many social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter, therefore, no matter your preferred choice for connecting with potential clients, the sky really is the limit with what you could potentially achieve by using Flickr.

Click to view the Digital Ark Flickr page. If you would like help setting up Flickr or for us to Do It For You, visit our contact page and send us an e-mail.

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48. How a Dedicated iPhone App Can Help Your Business

Monday, September 10th, 2012

When I think back to my childhood years and the ways, in which our family communicated with relatives in Australia, it conjures memories of listening to what I now know was a cassette tape recording of my cousin’s voices with carefully planned gaps which me the illusion I was actually talking to them in real time.

 

The world seemed to me then to be a much larger place that it does now. Since the conception of the World Wide Web my ability to communicate with distant relatives or work colleagues is instant without the need for elaborately planned charades and not only this but I can conduct many of my necessary day to day tasks both in business and pleasure not only by way of my computer but also whilst “on the go” with my trusty iPhone through the many applications from varying businesses and organisations.

 

I feel as though I am literally holding access to the world in the palm of my hand and for many businesses this is a vital tool with which to bring their services and products to fingertips of existing and potentially new clients from across the globe.

 

So why will an iPhone app help your business?

 

Small business appThe iPhone is undoubtedly the most popular smart phone in today’s market of mobile technology. Its many features have afforded all of its user’s ease of use and many will upgrade the moment a new model is released. As the iPhone can be connected to third party devices by way of the doc connector facility many businesses have been given the freedom to develop and implement their own iPhone application which becomes a marketing strategy which will help increase awareness of their company globally in the market they are involved in.

 

 

Once developed, iPhone applications are submitted to iTunes where they are then marketed for people to download to their iPhone. iTunes offer an application developing service however; since the use of such applications through iPhones has become an increasingly more popular way for people to access their many needs both professionally and personally, there has been a sudden increase in companies offering iPhone application development services.

 

As with a website it is vital to ensure that the application you create is easy to use. Think about the products and services that your company has to offer its clients and ensure you can fashion an application that will get both regular and potential customers actively involved with your business. Your business will always be with them either in a bag, briefcase or even in a back pocket (pretty much every place we choose to leave our mobile phone).

 

How will you be able to measure the success of your iPhone application? Simply by increased profit margins. Before engaging in the process of producing an iPhone application it would be prudent to peruse the catalogue of applications that may already available to consumers by your competitors and draw from these ideas which will ensure that whilst it may take a while for your own application to receive interest it will offer something unique which will soon see increased traffic to your business ideas, innovations, products and services.

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47. How Infographics Can Help Your Small Business

Sunday, September 9th, 2012

Marketing information of products and services to potential customers requires innovative and stimulating ways with which to present it so that it not only attracts as many people as possible but that it holds their interest. With technology continuing to advance on an almost daily basis there are more and more ways becoming available to put our businesses in the path of consumers yet on the other hand this means that as consumers are offered more information, there is more for them organise and collate.

 

Using Infographics as a way to present content is becoming more and more popular lately as they are a visually effective tool that if created well are intriguing, and compelling whilst providing all the necessary information to fulfil the consumers needs.

 

So what are Infographics? They have been in use for a long time; one of the most recognised uses of Infographics in the UK is the map of the London Underground.  Could you imagine how much longer it would take us to analyse and have an understanding of a journey we need to take if all that information was given to us in a long hand written format?

 

Using Infographics can make the reader pay attention and if you have their attention then they will continue to take in information and share this information more.

 

There are many motivating reasons for businesses to use infographics as part of their marketing strategy.

 

  • People enjoy reading information that enables them to learn from and gather information for their needs. Add to this visually stimulating images and the content will be worth sharing with others as it is even more compelling. This can increase traffic to websites and applications.

 

  • If created effectively like the map for the London Underground system, your infographic can be downloaded and saved or scanned with ease and with many people able to retain images in their memory easier than loads and loads of writing; your information could be retained in someone’s memory a lot longer.

 

  • If you allow your infographic to be shared from your website, blog or an application, then it can be embedded with code so there will always be an automatic link from the site sharing it back to yours. This can again increase the amount of traffic seeing your business and the products and services you have to offer.

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  • Infographics can be used with any and all types of marketing whether it is via the internet or printed matter such as leaflets and magazines.

 

  • If you have created an infographic which shows you are proven in its subject matter and provide clear demonstration of your knowledge and expertise then not only will you increase the potential for new clients but your infographic could go viral. This could have a positive nock on effect with your SEO and increase your rankings with search engines on the internet and heighten awareness for your brand of product and services.

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