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Every online organisation should be constantly looking for ways of positively influencing their customers’ purchasing decisions.
If you want to increase conversion rates, then you should consider video marketing to connect emotionally with customers, existing and potential, in a more direct way than ever before.
Although a relatively new technique in online marketing, having a video spokesperson has proven to be very successful resulting in increased customer action through direct sales, click throughs and page views.
Video is compelling and dynamic – unlike the more traditional static pictures and text that we’re used to.
Video has inherent appeal.Consider these figures from the Internet Advertising Bureau which show that in January 2009, 29.6 million people in the United Kingdom clicked onto online video.That’s eight out of ten internet users and a ten per cent increase on the year before. 
Most of us would prefer to see and hear something in preference to merely reading about it.And of course, we’re more likely to make a purchase if the person telling us about the product or service looks decent and trustworthy and sounds knowledgeable.The bottom line is, having a video spokesperson can sway your customers into making a purchase – and that’s exactly what you want.
These are some of the advantages of having a video spokesperson :
• They can present your key proposition in seconds
* They interface with customers on a direct, personal level and therefore give your website a human element
* They can be the human face of your website on the home page and the tour guide through other web pages
* They can boost your brand-building efforts as they embody your organisation’s brand personality.
Website video also :
* can improve customer understanding of the product or service and boost customer education
* builds rapport with customers through an emotional trigger
* Engenders confidence and trust
* generates useful customer feedback, increases the time spent on the page and converts more visits into sales
With some forethought and planning, your clients and your organisation will benefit.  It’s best to consult a professional web design company which has the advantage of experience and technological expertise in internet video production to maximise the benefit.Dale Carter, managing director of a web development company in Perth, GTP iCommerce, had these suggestions for online video.
“First impressions count.  The video has to be professionally done. Sound quality and high definition picture resolution are vital.The words that you use are also important.The online spokesperson must portray an image of credibility and professionalism.The spokesperson should use ‘you’ and ‘your’ language which is much more meaningful for the viewer than language such as ‘me’, ‘our’, ‘we’ and ‘us’.
“Script length is also important”, he said.”The average person will only wait eight seconds before they move on, so capturing and holding their attention is vital.Unlike web copy which viewers can skim through or download to read when time permits, video is real time so it needs to make an impact – quickly.A homepage greeting should be limited to a minute, with other scripts for product and information pages limited to around 90 seconds.”
Online video is a proven technique to connect directly with your customers on a more emotional and personal level than ever before.It’s cost effective, relatively simple to implement and the results are there to be seen.

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Article by John Black

Search engine Optimization or SEO as it’s become known by, is an essential ingredient for any website to achieve success.  However it can be very confusing for web site owners especially for those new to the whole idea of marketing online .  There are sometimes 3 reactions the whole concept of SEO ;

1.  Some feel that it is a waste of time and that simply the act of putting a website on the web is enough.

2.  Some feel that they can just do it all themselves and that there is not much to it.

3.  Many feel that it is certainly something that should be delegated to a professional and that their precious time is better spent doing things for their companies that they excel at.

All 3 views have merit, for a few companies just having a site is sufficient.  The sort of business this would work for is one that isn’t very likely to have people searching for their services on the internet.  As an example a private Chiropractic practice in a reasonably tiny city.

In barely larger cities, depending on the amount of competing companies have sites online, it may well be feasible to get superb results by doing a small amount of promotion yourself.

For the majority , however , getting it to work fine really does need the services of a professional Search Engine Optimization expert.
Search engine optimisation is a field that is constantly changing and the systems and techniques that need to be used to get good search engine visibility are also an ever changing phenomenon.

The great thing about using Search Engine Optimisation to get your site to rank well in the search engines is that it is advertising that not only is working for you 24 hours a day, seven days a week.  It is a way of bringing in customers that are actively looking for what you are supplying.

Consider the conventional kinds of advertising – newspapers, mags, TV, local papers or radio.  They are all a sort of shotgun approach, sending your marketing far and wide in the hope that your future clients happen to be reading, watching or listening to them at precisely the right time.

While with search engine promoting it is easily possible with good SEO services and a well set up site, to put your offering at once in front of the people that have purposely looked for your service by typing it into a search engine.

Another great thing about using search engine optimisation to raise your business, is that it is quantifiable.  Unlike more standard forms of advertising, it is completely possible to track what quantity of folks come to your site.  Not just that you can tell where in the world they come from, which keyword phrase they previously found you, which search engine they came via and how many came via each of the keywords.

with extra standard advertising not only is it a shotgun approach, usually it’s not quantifiable and usually the costs concerned are very high.

For cutting edge SEO services at a fraction of the cost of other Search Engine Optimization services visit www.linxhurricane.com today

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As the internet has become increasingly sophisticated, the various professional fields in the internet marketplace have become more and more specialized. In each area there have been massive leaps in complexity, usability, design and technology.

Even just a few years back, there were relatively few separate specialties for people who work within the arena of the internet. These days there is a vast multitude of ways in which people can specialize online. These professionals include:

Web designers,Information architects,Google Adwords campaign managers, various types of program and software developers and last but not least, SEO services.

In my experience, most web designers these days don’t even know how to include Search Engine Optimisation in the sites that they design and build. There is ample proof of this; it is visible easily every day by just taking a look at what is out there. Sites that have empty, or in some cases, no Meta tags no headline tags and even in some cases, no title tags at all either! The most frustrating part of this is that all of these measures are very easy to include.

So where does that leave the buyer? It leaves them with a website that will no doubt look fantastic; however the chances are that few will ever see it. Let alone become customers of whatever service or product the site is offering. This seems to be particularly true in the case of websites that contain a lot of flash, it looks great, but it is heavy in the browser and as it is purely images, the search engines cannot read it, even if there are words as the words themselves are rendered as images not text.

Therefore, when shopping for a website designer, be aware that though most will have the words ‘SEO’ or ‘Search Engine Optimisation‘ somewhere within their marketing or sales material. It is a good idea to check that that they really do know what that means, many of them do not. The way to check it out is to look at sites they have already completed – particularly their own. Check to see if it has Meta tags such as the keyword and description meta tag, check to see if their title tags actually have something useful in them not just ‘welcome to company XYZ website’.

These things are very easy to check. The title tag is easily visible to you as you open the site in your browser, you will see it on the very top of your screen. To check the other parts you will need to look at the source code, you can do this in Firefox by clicking on ‘View’ then on ‘Page Source’. This will show you all the code of the site, the meta tags should be near the top just after the the title tags.

Finally, take a look to see if the website has headline tags. Between these tags you should see the main headline of the page, this should include the keywords that you want people to find your website with.

Article by Johnathon Black

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Businesses are beginning to realize that a website isn’t enough to make a powerful online presence. Marketers have started to include blogging as a vital part of their online search engine optimisation and marketing mix. There are still some businesses out there that aren’t clear on how blogs can help them.

They simply came up with a blog, not knowing how to make it work to their favor. Blogs are highly versatile tools that are capable of executing the different aspects of marketing—from the basic market researches down to creative guerrilla marketing, blogs offer businesses a lot of breakthrough opportunities.

Below are 5 of the most practical ways in which a blog can help your online business.

1. Writing blogs can create stronger links with your target market
Publishing a blog makes it easier to give your brand a personality. Your blog allows people to directly interact with your brand, and they expect some sort of reply or acknowledgement that someone in your company has received and read their messages.

Maintaining this feedback loop allows you to keep an eye on your market and gives you a better conversion rate of prospects to loyal clients.

2. Blogs attract fresh insights and inform you of new category trends
You will receive interesting and fresh inisghts if you keep the lines of communication open for your blog visitors. The beauty of this is that you don’t need to pay anyone to talk to the consumers for you, but you still get the information straight from the primary source.

Organize the information you have gathered and make them work to your advantage, only you can do that. Go one step further by cross checking your data. Visit your comptitors blogs and see what their visitors have to say about them. Doing so would definitely give you a better view of your marketplace.

3. Blogs allow you to test your market before a full launch
Before fully launching an ad or any creative promo and campaign, you can execute a mini version of your plan through your blog and see how your audience responds. Suggestions and comments will pour in, giving you ideas on how you can improve and tweak it to better suit your market.

Companies spend a lot of money conducting FGDs and researches. These end up costing as much as—sometimes more than—a full-blown campaign. While blogs cannot replicate the accuracy of professional research groups, they can work well for a lot of market-driven studies.

4. Blogs allow you to spread theword about yourself online
Blogging networks survive on an amazing network of links. Bloggers are usually fine with linking fellow bloggers that they find interesting. Its a good idea to befriend top ranking blogs in your own category or at least related categories.

Ensure you make available, regular content and keep it updated to make sure your credibility is high.

5. Blogs allow you more room for creativity
Your blog can be the fun alter-ego of your corporate website. While this doesn’t mean a complete dissent from your brand’s identity, blogs allow you to close the gap between how you define your brand and how your market perceives your brand.

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What is Internet marketing?

1. Depending on whom you ask, the term Internet marketing can mean a variety of things. At one time, Internet marketing consisted mostly of having a website or placing banner ads on other websites. On the other end of the spectrum, there are loads of companies telling you that you can make a fortune overnight on the Internet and who try to sell you some form of “Internet marketing program“.

Today, Internet marketing, or online marketing, is evolving into a broader mix of components a company can use as a means of increasing sales – even if your business is done completely online, partly online, or completely offline. The decision to use Internet marketing as part of a company’s overall marketing strategy is strictly up to the company of course, but as a rule, Internet marketing is becoming an increasingly important part of nearly every company’s marketing mix. For some online businesses, it is the only form of marketing being practiced.

2. Internet marketing is relatively inexpensive when compared to the ratio of cost against the reach of the target audience. Internet marketing is a fantastic way to bring more profit to your business. Internet marketing is a lucrative way to deliver quality buyers for your services at little cost compared to most types of marketing services.

Search engines are important to your Internet marketing strategy because according to a recent study, some 85% of all Web site traffic originates from either a search engine or directory. Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is one of the most effective tactics used in e-Marketing today.

3. Internet marketing is the business of both advertising and selling goods and services over the Internet. This form of business is ever-increasing in popularity, with millions of people now making purchases on the Internet. Internet marketing began in the early 1990s as primarily a means of product description, consisting merely of text descriptions. As technology progressed, Internet marketing rapidly advanced to include pictures and other rich graphics as part of advertisements for products and services. After realizing the remarkable potential of this means of marketing, Internet-based companies started opening their virtual doors for business. As opposed to what are now known as “brick and mortar” operations, these e-businesses offer their products and services to a growing number of consumers, conducting all, or nearly all, of their business in the virtual world of the Internet.

There are many forms of marketing on the Internet. For more details go to www.split-test-profits.com Among them are article marketing, blog marketing, e-mail marketing, search engine marketing (to include search engine optimization), banner ads, pay-per-click ads, and pop-up ads. It is important to note that each of these forms catches the attention of the target market in different ways, and some may be more effective than others depending on the product or service, the target market, and the strategy and goal of the business marketing itself. Among the business functions that may require use of different means in their strategies are customer service, sales, public relations, information management, and others.

4. Internet marketing is still a complete mystery to a large majority of Internet users. For a lot of users, Internet marketing is seen as some odd area of the web, occupied with silly get-rich-quick schemes and nasty characters ready to rip off the innocent and uninformed customer at the click of a mouse.

Worldwide there are now over a billion Internet users, representing one large global consumer base or marketplace. The total amount of goods sold online has been steadily increasing each year as the Internet gains in both popularity and familiarity. Studies have shown people shop online because of lower prices, a wider selection of products, easier comparison shopping, and many just prefer not having to travel to stores to make a purchase.

5. Think of your website as a local shop that is situated down a dead end street. To succeed your customers need to know where you are and what you are about.

First of all this means having good road signs and there being a road layout that makes the street easy to get to. In the online world the road signs and layout are the website software and optimised content and they are just as important if you want online customers to find you.

6. Internet marketing is the research of the target audience, studying the market situation and predicting changes for the online market, plus the package of actions aimed at bringing potential customers to the website by improving the web site’s visibility in search engines and placing all sorts of ads throughout the Net. An integral part of the Internet marketing is the web site’s visits statistics.

Any of your actions toward increasing sales are to be evaluated in terms of their efficiency. The quality analysis of the Internet statistics will help you understand your prospective customers’ demands and interests, evaluate the attraction and retention methods that are good for the customers and reveal what makes them to not get interested in your products or services.

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