Why bother? Well, every smart person knows that to make any money, you have to go where the people are. You aren’t going to sell any product or market your service mooning over your table in your home office. And unless you have been living under a rock for the past twenty years, you would know that two hands on the keyboard could open more doors than your two feet pounding the streets ever could. A few options that are simple to implement (and more importantly free!) are:
Get an online presence
Don’t be scared by technical jargon. There are very easy ways to set up these pages with the advent of Facebook, blogging and free website services. Be sure that most of the businesses you see online did not pay thousands of dollars to set up. I assure you, there are many other areas your money should be spent at the start of your business and this does not really need to be one of them. At least not yet. Remember, if you aren’t online, you aren’t in business.
Check out setting up a group page on Facebook through www.facebook.com
Set up a blog in less than 5 minutes on platforms like Blogger and Wordpress
Use free website hosting sites like www.weebly.com and www.blinkweb.com
Have a creative or graphic designer on speed dial
These are the people that build the images that people around the world will have access to through the World Wide Web. So you might think this isn’t really a tech solution but your solution is nothing without proper content. Don’t try to do this all by yourself except you have relevant experience in this area. Even if you do, it’s not a bad idea to bounce your ideas around to get feedback and make it great. If you don’t, it’s not a problem as it doesn’t cost a lot of money to get it done. A helpful tip is to use the services of graphic design or art students or full time workers who do this as a hobby or are looking to break into mainstream graphic design market. What you save in cost, they can gain in much needed exposure. Everyone is happy.
Online videos
For certain products, visual marketing is the most effective. Visual business is great business because people respond positively to what they can see mainly because it is measurable and they can therefore form an opinion there and then. Say you want to promote a slimming program. Which do you think would be more effective? Some really long, drawn out text on your site praising the slimming product, or a slideshow and an interview with successful users of the product? Your guess is as good as mine.
A quick, easy, and FREE way of getting the word out is via YouTube. If you have content specific to a certain area there is an option open to people to filter their videos by location so that works well to streamline your market, without you lifting a finger. Awesome!
By the way, did I mention YouTube is owned by Google and what is uploaded on you tube can pop up fast on a Google search using SEO tools which we will come to in a subsequent post. Google is the number one search engine in the world, number two search engine - YouTube. Enough said.
Check it out on www.youtube.com
Mobile Marketing
Many more people have smart phones and more people buy them every day. There are also tons of free apps and software packages that can make your business go through the roof. The problem would be if you could honestly keep up with the demand. Case in point, how many people do you know have Blackberry phones, Iphones or the one trillion other smart phones fighting for attention in the open market? Exactly!
Ok. So I am assuming we are all computer literate. Just in case you aren’t (don’t worry I won’t tell anyone, your secret is safe with me), just quietly get about doing it. Free information is everywhere so just get in contact with a computer and use the help button on all the applications you want to learn like crazy! Don’t stop till you can comfortably navigate all the major applications that are used today. Microsoft Office Suite is a must and is probably the most used application in this part of the world as it is in many others. Don’t assume that you can coast through the world of business with a pen and paper. Those days are dead. Trust me!
Remember that to be valued, you must add value!
PS. This is by no means an exhaustive list so please feel free to add your own ideas of some more tech tools that small business owners can use to move ahead.
See you soon!
Aykay...
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