5 Popular Myths You Need to Ignore

The ability to easily share information on the internet can be great, but it can also be confusing.

Take online marketing for example, there is an incredible amount of information about it on various blogs and websites, but a lot of it is conflicting, not up-to-date or simply untrue.

Take a look at my top five online marketing myths below because you can’t believe everything you read. Read the rest of this entry »

How to Avoid Becoming a Dead End

There are many different ways to attract traffic to your website such as blogging, links on other sites and taking part in online business forums.

How do you know that your efforts are worthwhile though? Read on to discover three key areas you need to analyse in order to check where your traffic is coming from. Read the rest of this entry »

Discover What the Web’s Saying About You

When was the last time you Googled your own name or your business name?

Why does it matter? Well, it matters because there are millions of blogs, review sites and people on forums and Twitter all talking about businesses they’ve dealt with.

More and more people seem to be turning to the web to air their complaints, and these complaints may be getting picked up by Google and other search engines.

Imagine typing your company name into Google and finding a scathing review in position one – think of the damage that could do to your reputation. Read the rest of this entry »

Find Your Voice with SearchBlogger

When I started SearchBlogger in October 2010 I wanted to make it a useful resource of online marketing articles for small business owners.

I want to make this blog as useful as possible for my readers so would love you to get involved. Read the rest of this entry »

Follow These Guidelines Before You Launch

If you’re planning to sell anything online you need to be aware of the distance selling regulations (DSRs) and make sure you comply.

This article looks at some of the main DSRs (applicable in the European Union) and what you need to do as a small business e-commerce site owner. Read the rest of this entry »

Target Your Market in the Social Space

If you’ve never heard of Facebook Ads before, it works in a similar way to Google Adwords.

However, there are some key differences in these two methods of online paid advertising. Keep reading to learn more about Facebook Ads for beginners. Read the rest of this entry »

Microsoft’s Rival to Google Places

Microsoft recently announced the launch of Bing Business Portal with the aim of rivalling Google Places.

It was reported in early April that Microsoft was gaining ground on Google in the battle of the search engines with their market share through Bing and Yahoo reaching 30% of all searches for the first time. In the same period, Google saw its dominance reduced by 3%, falling below 65% for the first time.

Source: Experian Hitwise

Find out how Bing Business Portal compares to Google Places by reading the rest of my article. Read the rest of this entry »

The Pros and Cons of Offering Huge Discounts

If you’re not familiar with social coupon sites such as Groupon and Livingsocial, here’s the basic idea.

As a business you offer a large discount on your product or service to entice new customers in. It’s free to set up and your offer will be emailed to the thousands of subscribers in your town or city with the coupon company taking a cut off what you generate.

So what are the main pros and cons of going social with your discounts? Read the rest of this entry »

How User Generated Content can Affect Your Business

Whether you actively encourage customer reviews on your own website or have customers commenting on your products or services on third part sites, user generated content has a number of pros and cons.

Keep reading to discover the good, the bad and the ugly of user generated content. Read the rest of this entry »

How to Avoid These 5 Common Mistakes

When you’re starting out in business or don’t have much of a budget it can be tempting to cut corners. Emails you send out to customers are often neglected as an important tool.

Keep reading to learn five of the most common email mistakes made by small business owners, why these can make you look unprofessional and how to avoid them. Read the rest of this entry »