The Essentials

Essential Online Strategies Presentation Notes

Hello I am Kenneth Jackson. I own Connections Digital Media eCommerce Solutions.

Our Mission

We help our clients sell their products online, using search engines such as Google, Yahoo, and Bing; shopping search including Amazon, eBay, and Google Product Search; and social networks such as Facebook and Twitter.

We are an eCommerce service provider providing state of the art eCommerce and professional blogging at reasonable prices.

Today we will be talking about the three essential elements of a professional online presence.

• The Website
• Blogs
• Social Networks
• Email Marketing

At the end of this presentation you will have a basic strategy to move your online presence to the next level.

The Website – Establishing Site Goals

• The Basics
• Creating an Online Presence
• Business Information
• What Makes you Special
• Give Customers a Way to Contact You

The most basic website is simply an online brochure that is a quick synopsis of your business and it’s products and services, what makes you special, and how to contact you.

Hub of Your Marketing Activities

Anything you do with email, Facebook or other interactions with the internet should point back to your main site.

• Home Page
  • Generally Initial Point of Contact
  • Answer Questions
  • What Do You Do?
  • Why Should I Trust You?
• About Page
  • Reinforces Trust Factor
  • What Do You Do? (In Detail)
• Contact Page
  • Address
  • Phone Number
  • Email Address
  • Map

How Does Google Bot Work

• Follows Links
• Collects Text
• Ranks What It Finds and grades the quality of site content
• Presents Searchers with a List of Sites Based on Quality Score

The Importance of Keywords

• Theme Keyword – Should be included in the URL, title, header of the home page
• Category Keyword – Used to make up the categories and navigation menus

Layout and Keyword Flow

• Domain Name
• Site Name
• Page Name
• Heading
• Sub-Heading
• Body Text
• Sticky Post – Elevator Pitch

Why You Don’t Want a Flash Site

• Invisible to search engines
• Flash does not provide reference information for site analytics
• Needs constant updating
• Does not conform to web standard practices
• Not viewable on iPhones, iPads, or other mobile devices

The Blog

What Is A Blog?

A professional blog is a newsletter on steroids

Making your business stand out takes a more advanced strategy. A blog provides a way to start a dialog with your clientele. Maintaing a blog requires more commitment but the benefits are truly awesome. blogging offers you the opportunity to portray your thoughts and in sites into your business at length. this can make your website stick out and help your clients better understand your business.

A blog steps up interaction with potential customers. blogs are interactive. Your patrons can comment on you wares. You have an opportunity to build community around your product and easily keep customers informed about special events and offers.

• Blog Post Layout
• Keyword in The Title
• Keyword Variations in the Text

Introducing WordPress

WordPress is a free online web page creation tool that is so easy to use that literally anyone can make at least a basic web site within minutes. What is most impressive about WordPress though is the enormous variety of themes, plug-ins, and add-ons that make WordPress a web publishing powerhouse.

WordPress is open-source, that means that programmers and designers are allowed to come up with new plugins, themes, ect. to use with it.  There are thousands of free and low cost themes and plug-ins available, giving the you limitless ways to customize your website to suit your needs.

WordPress is now so widely used that it has become the web standard for blogs and small websites, but major players are also using it. Logon to the official sites for the White House, Martha Stewart, and CNN News, and you will see WordPress at its best.

WordPress is also the most cost effective solution out there for web owners. The software itself is free and as I mentioned earlier, so are many of the add-ons you might want to use. The easy to use interface makes it a cinch for even the most un-savvy users to create posts and update information, eliminating the need for a full-time IT professional or programmer to keep you up and running.

Of course many folks will still want a professional to create and install their site, as it can be quite time consuming for a novice, and the sheer enormity of choices can be overwhelming. A WordPress professional can guide you through the process to get the look and features that are right for you,  but even then the going rates for a professional WordPress site is fairly low, and well worth it.

Distribution

• Social Networks
• List Marketing

Social Networks – The Essentials

Social networks are tools to aid the distribution of information about your website.

Facebook – If You Do Nothing Else!

Not cool to promote your business extensively on your personal profile.

http://www.facebook.com/advertising/?pages

Twitter – Why We Care

Why Do We Use Twitter?

To keep people current on the news you want them to have up-to-the-minute.  While there is certain etiquette associated with most social networking platforms such as Facebook frowning on commercial self promotion, there are no such taboos on Twitter. You can talk about your business as much as you want and you are not going to offend anyone here. At least not for promoting yourself.

Twitter is also the best place to get the latest industry news, and heads up insight into the competition.  Real time inside information that you can put to work for you.

• AdHoc Communities
• Search Engine Optimization – Real Time Search

http://twitter.com

Flickr – Image Hosting

• SEO
• Link to your money Page
• Rich descriptions

The Newsletter – List Marketing

Getting customers to sign up for your email newsletter means you no longer have to wait for them to come to you. You can go to them!

MailChimp

RSS Campaign – entries added to your blog are automatically distributed to the sites mailing list.

Slides

As always Connections is happy to answer questions and assist you in any way we can to get your e-business up and running over the competition. Contact us at service@ConnectionsIS.com.