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Do You Have a Website or an Internet Marketing Strategy?

There seems to be an influx of people opening their own businesses, from consulting to project management, to aspired dreams. This is no surprise due to the rise in unemployment over the past year. These people have a dream, they see an opportunity and they believe enough to go out and market themselves. What surprises me is the lack of research or planning that goes into it. The time seems to be spent designing personalized websites, creating fancy business cards; essentially doing all the things a professional company would do to create a business, EXCEPT develop an internet marketing strategy. The planning seems to stop at developing the website in hopes that people will find them and their business will start to develop.

I spoke to three different people this past weekend who all told me they were venturing off on their own and opening a project management company. When asked how they are going to market themselves, I was left with the simple answer, ‘I have a guy developing my website' but no Internet Marketing Strategy.

There is a lot of noise out there and a lot to swallow when it comes to internet marketing or inbound marketing. The concept seems fairly new for many businesses. They are familiar with SEO and social media, and blogging, but hardly do I find anyone use the term internet marketing as an all-encompassing marketing strategy.

Every part of internet marketing is as important as the next but without the right tools, knowledge, and visibility, it's difficult to take it all in. I hear many that want to know how to get more involved in social media but don't have the content to promote themselves. I hear many companies talk about SEO and optimizing their site but paying someone to do it for them.

My advice to those starting a new business is to develop an internet marketing strategy. Do some research but remember that there is only so much you can read and analyze. At some point you need to just jump in.
1. Build a great website! Simple, easy to navigate, and content rich.
2. Use the right tools to optimize your site where you have complete control and visibility into the content that's going into your website.
3. Create a blog that speaks about your experience, you knowledge, and your expertise but also optimized to drive traffic to your site.
4. Promote your content through social media but remember to listen more than you speak.
5. Analyze everything. Analyze, analyze, analyze.

If you're starting a new business and are looking for a great internet marketing strategy, join us on this free webcast on how to build your brand with social media.