Online Budgets – Better Bangs For Your Buck!

Faced with a bewildering complex of online ‘must-do’ actions every business owner is told he must take to maintain the competitive edge, where do you make the best spend for effective results?

As business owners wake up to a new decade, they are also forced to open their eyes and put their hands in their pockets! If you’re not continually investing in your online presence then you’re not going to be in business in 2010.

Look at your history of online marketing campaigns. Have they been a little limited to date, mostly involving tired-looking and repetitious email marketing that returns fewer results each time?

If you are planning to increase the amount you spend, however, then the advice is : you first need to put the money where it’s proved to be working best for you, i.e. target the platform that is already generating the most returns and see if an increased budget translates into even more sales.

But you also now need to involve your business in positioning online brand awareness and close customer engagement within specific targeted social media feedback environments – optimising with the right content in the right place at the right time!

Key effective online actions you need to take:

Web Design / Web Refresh – common sense dictates that before you rush ahead with traffic-driving marketing strategies, you must ensure your site is tuned up ready to provide the ‘experience’ that your potential niche customers will expect. Every step along the way from ‘first landing to check out’ must be fully tried, tested and known to be functioning to the max!

A website refresh , every few months or so maintains interest, shows integrity and is a known renewed traffic driver!

SEO – Despite the tough competition, ‘organic’ SEO is still the core strategy to develop long term leverage to climb the PageRank ladder! Techniques such as localised search and carefully targeted keyword phrase optimisation should be almost a daily activity as this proven marketing tool needs constant sharpening in order to harvest better results.

PPC – Also known as ‘paid search’, Pay-Per-Click is the advertising at the top and sides of the page results (SERPS). A thoroughly researched and carefully key worded ad can be extremely effective – but you do need to call on the services of skilled and experienced SEO specialists.

Social Media – directly speaking and interacting with your target audience and potential niche customer via instant social networks such as Twitter and Facebook is where smart business is seen to be actively engaged. Writing a regular blog, back linked articles, micro blogging and newsletters are all cost-effective stimulants of customer engagement.

But copy needs to be genuinely relevant, informative and above all, hold interest. Regular time and high skills are required, so once again, working closely with an expert web design agency who offer killer content writing services is money well spent.