Online Marketing. How Can You Be Effective On A Small Budget?

     Do you ever find yourself questioning your product? How come the only way I can get quality customers to my door, is to go broke with the Pay Per Click search. How can I streamline my marketing, and have a mixture of PPC, Low Cost, and Free advertising? Online marketing can be complex and there are so many variables.
     The first thing you should do is make sure your Ads on the big search engines are optimized. This is so you do not waste your hard-earned income on ineffective ads. Did you know that when you advertise with Google, or Microsoft Adcenter, you qualify for representation (assistance) for thirty days per new domain? They will point you and your ads in the right direction. It is a service many are not aware of. They will help you write your ads, set up keywords and suggest your bid pricing. I will be the first to say that it does make a big difference.
     Did you ever think your Domain Name can improve your sales? A catchy, easy to remember name can make a significant difference. Did you know your own Domain Name comes up easier in the search engines than does those from a free hosting site? Some search engines can't crawl down the sites of free hosting services. Also watch the size of your domain, keep your domain as small as possible. Make it easy to remember, and for business use, always go for.com. Search for your domains at byAdomain.com. Finally, I suggest picking out a domain name with your major keyword or product name in the domain name.
     If you are looking for places to advertise, there are no shortages of places. The question though is, how effective are they? I do not recommend spending a lot of your allotted marketing funds on anything but the big search engines, for now. Some recommended low-cost effective alternatives are; a.Facebook: They do have PPC advertising, and you can set up a page for your business. Tell all your friends and family. b. PocketCents: They have a flat rate of $.25 per click and they direct the ads to only the uses who are interested in your product. c. Clicksor, Bidvertiser, and Adbright, are all affordable and have multiple options to choose from. d. Advertising.com: Around 183 million users a month on this alternative advertising network.
     Free advertising is very much hit or miss, but you would be wise to take advantage of as many as possible. The first one I recommend is Craigslist. You will have to be creative though, they will kick, or not allow your ads if they are the same as another ad in another city. Just change a couple words here and there in your ad. The next free venue is eBay , it is free to place the ad, and you will only pay anything once a sale is made. Another is Amazon, and the same thing applies. I almost forgot, do you see where you are reading? This is an Ezine Article, and it is free and so are most Blogs, and they are great avenues to your business. This is at the top of my list of low cost advertising, and if you enjoy writing, and you are good at it, you will reap the rewards.  Write about your experiences and know how. Tell some of your secrets and you will build friendships. Also, submit your website frequently.  Did you know it can take a search engine up to six months to index your website.  Indexing your website makes it easier for the search engines to display your website in the search results screen.  So, submitting your website regularly, will ensure its submission into index.  Most submission sites allow you to submit for free, but also have a paid option for faster indexing.  Do your homework on the website before investing.  I would personally stick with the free option for now.  Look for my next article where I will try to explain the benefits of a great Link Exchange Program, to help your website rank higher in the search engines.  Other places that will generate a lot of traffic to your website, (Note: from my experience, that is all it is, traffic, traffic.  I never did generate a sale), they are EasyHits4U, Traffic Era, and Webmasterquest.com. These are exchange websites were you view a random webpage for a certain number of seconds, and in return your webpage is displayed to another user in the system. This is great for traffic to your website, and to create name recognition.
     Finally, did you also know the layout of your Website, color, font style, and location of articles has effects on your overall bounce rates. Did you know that the white background is the most affective? That does not mean that all other colors are ineffective. Make it easy for your readers; do not make your readers squint, for they will leave. Keep the basic fonts for your articles, do not use exotic fonts. Time New Roman, Arial, or Calibri are great for articles and are easy to read. If you do not have many options with your free hosting page, then try byAdomain.com , they also have easy point drag and click professional Website Builders. Now a day you do not need a website designer. Technology has enabled the capable computer user to create a professional looking website with just a couple drags of a mouse. Advertising on the internet can be complicated, but with a little help from each other and a little research, maybe it can get a little easier. Stay in touch for updates and more experiences learned from myself, and hopefully by user comments.
     Look for my next article about the Link Exchange Program.