A Southern Living At Home independent consultant methodology for search engine marketing.

A Southern Living At Home independent consultant methodology for search engine marketing.

Can you believe that 192 days have passed since the beginning of 2005?

Just as 2003 and 2004 marched forward in the blink of an eye, 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 marketing drive is 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 do I get them to my site?" 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 attracting targeted traffic by running little ads in the various search engines (like Google's AdSense program). Done correctly, you can get ongoing affordable traffic. And best of all, you can keep within a budget that makes sense when compared to the results you get from that traffic.

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)

From New York to L.A. you'll find 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.

Online retail sales in the first quarter reached $19.2 billion, up 23.8% from Q1 a year ago. (Source: U.S. Department of Commerce 05/2005)

But I'm A Southern Living At Home independent consultant, I'm certain it's almost impossible considering my situation?

Maybe you are thinking that "some things" sell online but not your garden accessories, home accessories-decor & books. 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.

In my previous blog entries (last week and the week prior) 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. Without any further delay, I'll continue with my tips this week.

Pay per click tips for this week:

• If your product or service is something that can be related to a locale, like a city, state or region you may be able to find some ripe tomatoes in phrases like: 'retirement homes in Florida', 'Mississippi flat rate phone service', 'herbal sunscreen for southwestern sun', 'indoor air filters for Los Angeles'.
• Discover more keywords by narrowing down to extreme specifics. People can be VERY specific when they search. Use names of months and years like '2004 tax savings', 'May flowers', 'Christmas of 2005' or 'September back to school supplies'.
  
  Let's say you are marketing a broad line of herbal products... why not get a list of all herbs (there may be thousands) and use that list as a keyword list. Maybe your product doesn't contain every herb on the list, but people searching for any ONE herb specifically may be interested in others. Try specific model numbers, makes and designs if your products are sometimes referred to this way: 'Epson stylus CX6400', 'Apple G5', etc.
• Add adjectives to your keywords like: big, purple, new, cheap, affordable, soft, aromatic, healthy, etc.

Looking for more suggestions? Check my posts from previous weeks for more ideas and strategies.

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 Southern Living At Home interesting or helpful.

Check back next week for the next in this series of PPC tips... Until next week, happy PPC campaigning...


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