A Home Interiors and Gifts decorating consultant guide for search engine results without breaking the bank.

A Home Interiors and Gifts decorating consultant guide for search engine results without breaking the bank.

Day by day, tick by tick, and click by click, time is passing and none of us are getting any younger. Has anyone mentioned to you that 192 days have passed since the beginning of the year?

As most of us continue our attempt to drum up some business, 2005 is rapidly marching on, yet for may web entrepreneurs few visitors are marching over to see what's up. Are they marching to a different drummer or is it that your attempts to generate traffic are just not keeping the beat?

Do you sell home furnishings or decor? Home furnishings is the fastest growing category of merchandise selling online. Roper s survey of online adults earlier this year shows that 25% have purchased a home furnishings or decor item online in the past year, up from 17% a year before. (NOP World s Roper Reports 08/2004)

With 173 days remaining in 2005, imagine how much different your business would be if you could get a marketing plan implemented that dropped dozens of targeted prospects and visitors to your web doorstep each and every week.

If you're asking "How can I achieve his goal?" Maybe a little internet advertising is in order? Seems that's what a lot of successful online marketers are doing. And of all the methods out there, nothing seems to beat a well managed pay per click search engine campaign...

Online ad growth of 33.7 percent is expected in 2005 to $12.7 billion, raising a previous estimate of $11.5 billion for the year. eMarketer had estimated 2004 ad revenue at $9.5 billion. (Source: eMarketer 04/2005)

All around the world you havve reports, stories and statistics that prove "it can be done". Yes, online sales are happening. Reports are continuing, sales are up, and the drum beats on.

The Web is gaining a larger share of the overall retail market. Total online sales in 2004 reached $69.2 billion, just shy of 2 percent of all retail sales in the country. (stats from: U.S. Department of Commerce 02/2005)

But I'm A Home Interiors and Gifts decorating consultant, I'm certain it's almost impossible considering my situation?

Maybe you are thinking that "some things" sell online but not your giftware, home accessories & decor. Nothing could be further from the truth. In most cases, it is not the product or service that hinders a sale, it boils down to traffic, strategy and page presentation. Whether you advertise using Google's AdWords, or do pay-per-click at Overture, Yahoo or MSN search, it's the campaign strategy that's important.

Over the past two weeks we started our series of PPC search engine tips. These tips will unquestionanly help your marketing campaign and hopefully put some of the statistics on your side. So as promised, below you'll find this weeks installment of search engine tips...

Tips for your PPC campaign:

• Expand your keywords by asking your spouse, friends, neighbors, relatives, existing customers and strangers to look at your web page and offer their keyword suggestions. In this phase you cannot have too many cooks in the kitchen.
• Put your biscuits in the oven and watch'em rise... That is, use web based 'keyword expanders' and research tools to expand your keywords beyond what you can come up with on your own.
• Remember, searchers may type in something that describes your product, but more often than not they will be typing in words describing their problem. If your product or service solves, fixes, heals, masks or even distracts them from their problem, you want those keywords on your list.
• "In-house" keywords (those used frequently by others in your industry or business) are often the most costly because lazy business owners don't often think beyond their own nose. The result is these limited keywords get bided-up sky high. Customers on the other hand seldom search using "in-house" keywords. Your goal is to find keyword niches popular with customers but less popular with your competition.

Last week I posted the another round of search engine marketing tips and yet more the week before that. Check there for more ideas.

In addition, I've written a many 'how-to' articles specifically to help get your internet marketing strategy on-track. You might find these internet marketing articles for Home Interiors and Gifts interesting or helpful.

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