The 1980s are remembered for their developments in business and technology, particularly computing. The 1990s for their advances in technology, particularly the growth of the internet and online business opportunities. If the 2000s are to be remembered for anything (although it may still be too early to tell), it will be their developments in communications and online communities, particularly the incredible power of social media.

Blog forums are a great place to start generating free traffic for your blog. Because of the obvious shared interest in the topic, blog forums create new interest and grow your following.

Last week we looked at building relationships and growing our business by creating a blog. We discussed finding and incorporating our branding into free or low-cost themes, ways to capture an audience, and how to build trust by being honest and professional to attract a good following. 

A blog is a great marketing tool to connect with a specific audience.  Blogs allow you to build a relationship, and establish a level of trust, a critical piece in establishing your expertise and creating the desire to connect to you, and your products or services.   It is important to establish good practices on your business blog, being certain never to lie

There are many Internet marketing strategies to promote an online business. Using popular options like article marketing, pay-per-click advertising, forum marketing and email marketing can increase your success. The business owner will need to track click-throughs and conversion rates to achieve more success by converting people into paying customers. 

According to research released recently by O2, the mobile phone provider (“Small Businesses are Catching Twitter Bug,” Richard Tyler, The Telegraph, 16 March 2009), almost one in five small businesses now tweet regularly. Although the larger, multinational firms were the first to jump on the Twitter bandwagon, increasing numbers of small to medium sized businesses are taking the plunge.  … Continue reading the rest of this article...

Last week we discussed finding the right way to follow people; what types of information to post to keep followers engaged; and encouraged you NOT to spam your followers for fear of  being unfollowed. 

This week in Part Two, we’ll learn how to follow the right people and why using patience over the long-term will give you the best results for your business. 

Following the Right People … Continue reading the rest of this article...

As I’ve continued to grow my media marketing options, it has become evident that ‘following’ everyone is not the best tactic to use when using Twitter as a business marketing tool.  While it will require a bit of patience and a well thought-out strategy, it can be easily accomplished. Twitter is popular for businesses because of the no-cost, no-frills way it’s designed. 

The path to increasing your targeted Twitter… Continue reading the rest of this article...

In Part One we discussed blog basics, promotion and whether or not it was a worthwhile endeavour. 

Continuing along those lines, and equally important to your website, a blog will also require a bit of SEO (search engine optimization), carefully chosen keywords and tags, as well as, listings with directories and indexes such as Technorati, StumbleUpon, or Digg, just to mention a few. Reading and responding to other people’s… Continue reading the rest of this article...

Web logs (blogs) came into play in the late 1990s, but today they offer options beyond those of aspiring writers or the simple online diaries of old. 

The terrain of the blogosphere has changed radically. Governments and big business have homed in on blogs as a focus of social media marketing with blogging options such as microblogging via Twitter is all the rage. While some believe the blog has… Continue reading the rest of this article...