Jared Lansky Ad BuySell Blog

By: John Reed
When you first start your website, you have the hopes and dreams that once you build it, the flocks of web surfers will somehow come to it.

It’s not that simple, but there are a few steps that a tiny budget website can do to give itself the most powerful chance at growing fast and being a success.

Before we get into the moves you need to make, you must understand why you must make them.
Advertising is a fun thing to do when done correctly but can be a pain in the rump if approached incorrectly. Most people will tell you that their initial experience with advertising was a frustrating one but it doesn’t have to be that way. Advertising can be a rewarding and successful experience if one does not get dragged into the foolishness of following the crowd.

You see, in advertising, the only crowd that you should be interested in, is the crowd that can help you reach your goals. That would be the crowds of web surfers. If you follow the crowd of your competitors, you are playing right into the hands of the “foolishness” that I mentioned earlier. That is because when crowds of advertisers show up in a certain place or begin using a certain marketing tactic, THE PRICE OF GOOD SPOTS GO UP CONSIDERABLY and THE VISITORS THAT YOU WANT CAN’T FIND YOU DUE TO YOUR ADS BEING PRICED OUT OF POSITION.

As a small business, only targeting the spaces that the big guys do is the same as throwing money away. Often times your ad is pushed so far out in left field that the clicks are minimal due to no one actually seeing it.

The best thing that a small website with a small budget can do is take the time to focus the money inward in the early stages. What I mean is, if your website has the features that warrant their attention it does much of the attracting itself. I don’t mean that you should not advertise, just embark on this journey using good sense. It will save you so much money in the long run.

If you advertise a website that is not up to par, your chances of success is very limited. You will simply throw money at the problem and have none of that financial investment come back to you. Is that what you want? I don’t think so. Most website owners are attempting to accomplish something with their websites. Coming shy of accomplishing their goal is not something that appeals to them. Don’t set yourself up for frustration.

In times past, focusing the money inward meant not doing any advertising but that has changed with advertising websites like TypoBounty.com. I would suggest that every new website begin advertising in a location that allows the money to contribute back to the effectiveness of the website. Such a low cost venue that provides so many website services for the same money is optimum for websites that are just starting out.

When you advertise on TypoBounty.com visitors look for ways that your website can be better and report it to you. If they see misspelled words they tell you, if your punctuation is off the let you know. There are so many other benefits but you will jus have to visit their advertising page to understand how it works. There is too much to list here.

Getting more for your money when you don’t have very much money to begin with is the key to growing a website into a powerful player on the world stage of the Internet.

By: Sharon Gantt
Once you’ve finally made the decision to begin a pay per click advertising campaign or any advertising campaign for that matter, what’s next?

Next you need a well thought out marketing plan.

Now that you’re finally going to get traffic to your website, what are you going to do with it? If you’re running a pay-per-click campaign properly, traffic will come. If you chose a Google Qualified and Yahoo Ambassador to manage your PPC campaign you should feel pretty confident that your campaign will be professionally handled. Outsourcing to a search engine qualified company will save you time and money. If it’s traffic you want it’s imperative you hire a company that knows how to get it. Remember, a well-run PPC campaign is vital to your business and usually is the difference between online success or failure.

Once you start getting traffic what do you really expect from a new visitor to your website? Are you expecting them to see a picture of your product,immediately reach into their pocket, pull out a credit card and click on your order form? If that’s your expectation let me save you some heartache. For the most part the scenario described above probably won’t happen.

Most likely, what happened is that you skimmed the offer, hit the back button, checked competing offers, and thought it over. Visitors to your web site are (more or less) like you. They’re going to do the same thing. Now, that should put some context into the mix for you, and tells you something you should be doing. Comparison shop.

Take a look at other sites that come up on the AdWord you bought. What offers are there? How are they presented? How does yours stand out from the mix, in a positive manner? What sort of mood would a customer be in if they’re hitting your site in a given search pattern? Will they be happy, sad, grieving, stressed, or passionate about something? Make sure your web site fits the mood of the visitor to make that positive impression, so they’ll come back after doing the comparison shop.

Notice what it isn’t asking for? Someone to put a high pressure sell tactic on them, and try to finagle their credit card out of their wallet. And yet, so many pay per click ads lead to web sites that are nothing but “buy, buy, buy” that it’s kind of scary how bad the marketing acumen is for the people who set them up.

Given that they’re going to hit the back button eventually, you need to find a way to build a relationship with them. Now, the best relationship is one where they bought a product from you, are happy with the product, and come back for repeat business; ultimately, you want to migrate all your contacts on your web site to this model. Before you can get there, you need to establish trust and responsibility.

The easy way to do this is offer them a taste of the content they’ll get for subscribing. You get their contact info, they get your information content (with offers for products they might be interested in), and it’s a fair trade. This also establishes that you have a deep and abiding interest in the subject matter, are willing to share information on it, and are willing to be patient enough to let them make up their own minds. That shows that you respect them. Which is the foundation of any lasting, long term relationship, whether romantic, or commercial.

By: Jason Tissuix
As a small business, you’re probably already aware of the importance of your website as a great marketing tool. However, if you want to increase traffic and potentially generate more sales, you might have also thought about doing some advertising. The question is, do you go online or stick with the tried-and-trusted medium of print?

Online Vs Print Advertising

Although expensive, print has traditionally been one of the most effective mediums in which to advertise products or services. However, it looks like the internet is now taking over. The internet has many advantages over print advertising; it is cheaper, reaches a larger audience and can be more versatile. This makes it ideal for small businesses that want maximum exposure for a minimal cost.

Google and Online Advertising

Google are the undisputed leaders of online advertising, pioneering the ‘Pay Per Click’ method of advertising. This advertising method allows small business to explicitly target their ideal clients and – as the advertiser only pays for the customers who have actually clicked on their online advert – it is also an affordable way of advertising for smaller companies. However, online advertising certainly doesn’t end with Pay Per Click.

Advertising on Social Networking Sites

Arguably the most popular websites in the world today, social networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace are also massively popular with advertisers. They offer a huge audience of young web users, rendering them ideal for advertising new music, films, beauty products and fashion.

Because they boast such potent advertising power, social networking sites are constantly looking for new ways to offer space to potential advertisers. Myspace is currently in the process of testing Community Builder, a new advertising platform that will maximise the potential of their advertising space.

Myspace Community Builder

Myspace’s Community Builder has been designed to let advertisers build and manage their own brand profiles on the site. MySpace had previously let advertisers promote their brands by featuring profiles on the site, but it had handled both the creation and the updating of these profiles on behalf of the advertisers.

The site’s Community Builder platform is different, as it will allow advertisers to have more control over their own profiles, allowing them to update content and features without Myspace’s involvement.

By making a Myspace profile for their products, advertisers can attract Myspace users to visit them online and perhaps even add their product or service as a MySpace friend. Having a Myspace profile for a product or service also allows Myspace users to interact with the brand by playing videos, entering competitions, and listening to songs.

The Future

There are a number of other websites who are keen to build on the success of internet advertising, so small businesses who are looking to advertise their products or services online will soon have more options than ever to do so.

By: Anthony Samuel
Advertising is one of the many marketing tools that are used to attract attention of prospective customers to a business or its products or services. The more effective an advertising campaign, more the customers it draws, and with greater frequency. Advertising is part of the overall marketing strategy of a business, which includes public relations, promotional programs, signage, incentives, newsletters, and word of mouth, among other strategies. The aim of a marketing strategy is to use advertising, along with these other tools, for maximum impact.

History of Advertising

If you think that advertising is a modern phenomenon, think again. The earliest forms of advertising, of course, would have been through word of mouth. Advertising - for sales, and lost-and-found - was commonly created on papyrus in ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome. Commercial advertising, through wall or rock paintings that goes back to 4000 BC, has been found in many parts of India, Africa, and South America. Commercial and political advertising displays have been recovered from the ruins of the ancient Pompeii, a Roman city destroyed by the volcano -Mount Vesuvius - in 79 AD.

With the development of printing technology in the 15th and 16th centuries, handbills were used as a form of advertising. By the 17th century, newspaper advertisements made their way in England, which were mainly for printed books, and medicines. By the 19th century, classified advertisements became popular in the United States for promoting a variety of goods. This century also brought in the first advertising agency in Philadelphia, in 1843. From just being brokers for ad space in newspapers, the advertising agencies graduated to writing ad contents by the 20th century.

First with TV, followed by Cable TV, and now with the development of Internet, the very face of advertising has changed.

Impact Of Advertising

“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is, I don’t know which half.”

- John Wanamaker, father of modern advertising.

Advertising certainly has a lot of impact on what we buy, or do not buy. There is a lot of debate going on, for and against the impact of advertising, but one thing is clear, it does affect our buying trends, for good or for worse.

Today, with the advent of the Internet and its impact on our everyday lives, it has provided new advertising opportunities. As part of the marketing strategies on the Internet, Popup, Flash, banner, advergaming - the practice of using games, particularly computer games, to advertise or promote a product or an organization - and email advertisements, among others, abound. Unfortunately, email advertising has taken the form of spam.

Another significant trend brought about by the Internet, and which seems to be the future of advertising, is niche, or targeted, ads. Niche, or targeted, advertisements allow advertisers and businesses with an increasing ability to reach narrow, or targeted, audiences. In the old days of advertising, the trend was to find ways to deliver your advertisement, efficiently, to as large a mass of audience as possible. Today, however, the trend has changed.

Using tracking, customer profiles, and the such, niche content is brought by advertisers to smaller, but better defined, audiences. These ads are more releveant to the smaller audiences, and hence more effective. Video on demand ads target specific groups. These ads can be watched by the audiences from their homes, who choose to watch only those ads they actually want to watch.

Whatever form your advertising takes, it should do the following:

- Remind customers and potential customers of the benefits of your products or services.
- Establish and maintain your distinct identity, and brand.
- Build sales to boost your bottom line.