If you are looking for ways to distinguish your small business from the bigger competition, we have 10 ways you can put yourself forward:

1. Focus on the High Quality and Uniqueness of Your Product

Your first move is to offer a high quality product that your audience wants. Even if your product is similar to what someone else is offering, you can distinguish it in some way. Is it made using the finest materials? Do you have some sort of handmade product that is unique? Focus on the way that your product is different, and show how it offers something above and beyond. Discerning customers will appreciate the quality of your offering.

2. Offer Superior Customer Service

Word gets around when you offer superior customer service. A big company can lose site of individual customers. However, as a small business, you have a chance to connect on a more personal level with your clientele. Provide customer service that is accessible, and high quality. Work to make your customers happy, and they will not only remain loyal to you, but they will become fans that share you product with friends and family.

3. Create a Strategy for SEO

When writing content for your blog, or when writing descriptions of products and services, consider your SEO strategy. The major keywords might all be hogged by the big companies, but there are ways to focus your efforts. Use a keyword tool to help you identify successful keywords. Also, focus on phrases, rather than single words, and don’t underestimate the power of long-tail, organic results. Pay attention to the long-term, and keep your SEO strategy in mind, and you will be more likely to find success.

4. Strategize with PPC

Yes, PPC advertising costs money. However, it might be worth to you if getting in on high-revenue keywords is too difficult. Carefully evaluate your keywords, and what you want to happen with your keywords. Then, target a few high-yield keywords for PPC advertising. You can pay for the ads, and you likely find good results. However, research is essential, since you don’t want to waste your money. It’s about putting your money where it will do the most good.

5. Create a Social Media Profile

Interaction with others is essential for success on the Internet. As a result, it is vital that you set up a social media profile. A social media profile that allows you to use keywords (social media profiles are increasingly searchable), and allows you to share your insights on relevant topics, can draw more people to your web site—and even result in more sales. Your social media profile should be consistent across web sites so that visitors can readily identify your brand.

You don’t need to join every social media site, but you can benefit from identifying the sites your audience is most likely to visit. Establish a presence, sharing useful information (don’t just push your products), and interacting with customers, and you will build a loyal following that rivals the big companies.

6. Pay Attention to Inbound Analytics

Use analytics to tweak your approach to marketing your products and services. Pay attention to where traffic is coming from (what sites refer visitors), as well as what times of day the traffic is heaviest. You can also use inbound analytics to see which keywords and keyphrases are most popular for driving traffic to your web site. Use this information to adjust when you post new content to your blog, as well as to focus on different keywords. With the right analytics information, you will be able to direct your resources more profitably.

7. Use the Right Technology

Determine what technology is likely to help your business grow. As a small business owner, it can be difficult to do everything all at once. The right technology can help you automate some tasks, such as sending out emails, submitting to social bookmarking web sites, and generating coupon codes. Figure out which technology is likely to help you the most, and then use that technology. You will free up more of your time for building your business, and spend less time fretting about smaller housekeeping tasks that can become time consuming and tedious.

8. Build Your List

Invest some time and effort into building a solid opt-in list. Your list should include leads that can be used to improve your business. You will need to encourage people to sign up, so that means spending time creating attractive landing pages, and encouraging people to find you on Facebook. Offer premium content, or insider deals. Think of ways that being on your list could be seen as a benefit. More customers will opt-in, and you will see more repeat business and better success as you reach out to leads through your list.

9. Be Flexible

One of the advantages to owning a small business is that you have a certain amount of agility that the big guys don’t always have. Remain flexible in your business. Be willing to change your approach if something isn’t working. Quickly react to industry news, and adjust to the demands of your market. Your ability to be flexible can give you an edge as you work to expand your business.

10. Hire Good People

Even a small business occasionally needs to make hires. Before you hire someone, though, you need to make sure that you will be filling a need. Evaluate your strengths and weaknesses. Acknowledge areas that need improvement, and then hire someone to fill that need. You should find someone who is knowledgeable about something you don’t understand as well. Hire good people who can help you navigate the waters, and provide you with expertise that you need.

It is possible to compete with the big guys as a small business. While you may not end up with billions in revenue, you can still do quite well—no matter how small your business is. With the right planning, and with a little ingenuity, you can hold your own, and grow your company.

This guest post was written by Lior Levin, a marketing consultant for a large neon open sign company that provides various custom made neon signs.

We made the list of the top 25 make money online blogs to follow in 2012. In fact, we are the first blog mentioned on the list!

Although this isn’t the first time we have made a list like this, it’s still always a great honor to be mentioned on them. It lets us know that we are successfully doing the job we set out to do; teach regular people how to make money online.

Please take a moment to share the list with your friends on Facebook and other social networks. They also have twitter, G+1, and stumbleupon submit buttons conveniently located just above the post that you can use. Anything you can do to help spread the word will be greatly appreciated!

As an entrepreneur, it is vital to have your money affairs in order. What your credit profile says about you also reflects on your business. It is important for you to pay attention to not only where you are financially but also where you stand credit-wise.

Working in the online market can be highly profitable but it requires a stable financial foundation to start with. If you are planning to get any type of financing in the future for business or personal, it is imperative you do the work to repair your credit now rather than wait until it is too late.

Why Good Credit Matters:

• In Your Business Life

Working as an entrepreneur, your business needs to build its own foundation financially but it will first rely on the credentials of the business owner. If you have poor credit scores, it will be hard for you to get any kind of financing to start or grow your business. You will also find it difficult to do business with vendors and suppliers with whom you need a line of credit.

Before you start a business online or off, you need to review your credit score and do the work necessary to get it back into the excellent sector. Your credit will be the springboard to starting a stable foundation for your business’s credit.

• In Your Personal Life

Most entrepreneurs start a business for the flexibility and the financial freedom self-employment offers. One of the most apparent drawbacks of working for yourself is the potential for inconsistent income. You should start a business knowing you have at least a year’s worth of living expenses saved in the bank for when the business is still getting off of the ground. While many people will not wait until that amount has been saved up, most at least have some fall back money to tide them over and prevent serious issues with debt.

At some point you will want to enjoy the benefits of your company’s profitability. Socking away funds for retirement and purchasing a home are two common goals of the self-made business owner. But if you maintain a poor credit score, it will be difficult for you to save extra money because you’ll end up having to spend more cash over your lifetime for basic services including utilities, cell phone plans, and car insurance.

If you are able to afford a new home purchase as a self-employed entrepreneur, it is imperative to not only have your finances in order, your credit will play a large factor in not only the approval for the home loan, it will also dictate how much you end up paying on your monthly house note. The amount of interest on the mortgage you receive will be directly related to your credit score. If you can maintain a credit score over 730, lenders will not only give you the best rates, but also more loan options.

Credit scores under 730 may put you at risk for not getting approved for your home loan. They will also basically guarantee you will pay a much higher interest rate over the life of your loan. More of your business profits will need to go toward your mortgage payment. It is not just a small amount either. Just a few points difference in your mortgage interest rate can literally mean you will pay hundreds of thousands of dollars over the life of your mortgage loan.

Moving Forward With Better Credit

Since you have put so much effort into getting your business up and running at the same time balancing the rest of your life, it only makes sense for you to first start with the job of clearing your credit history and maintaining the highest credit score possible.

Despite the claims of some companies, credit repair is something every consumer is capable of accomplishing. Credit history reports are available to every consumer free of charge once a year and for 60 days after you have been denied credit approval. Credit scores are not a part of the free deal but for a minimal fee, you have instant online access to the credit scores maintained by the consumer credit reporting bureaus including TransUnion, Experian, and Equifax.

Once you have ordered your reports and scores, you must review all of the data contained in your credit history and double-check the data for inaccurate information which can lower your credit score. Incorrect information can be disputed with the agencies listing the data.

You need to account for all accounts that still have an outstanding balance and make a reasonable plan to pay off these debts and improve your credit profile. By eliminating debts, you will not only clear your credit, you will also have less financial pressures from your startup operating.

The better your credit is, the less you’ll have to pay in down payments, deposits, and interest rates moving forward in both your business and your personal life. Do what you can now to fix your credit because while any consumer has the power to improve their own credit, there is no overnight solution to repair credit histories. It takes time to improve your credit scores so work consistently over the next several months and see what a difference a little focus can make. Take your credit as seriously as you do your business and you’ll reap rewards for the long term.

Guest post written by… J.D. Roberts is a seasoned writer in finance, specializing in credit repair. You can find more of his articles located at CreditRepair.org

Whether you are a casual user who is on these sites for fun and connecting with others, or you use them as a business marketing tool for making money online, there’s no denying the power of social media. The world is now more connected than ever before. On any given day you might have an online interaction with someone from every continent of the planet.

So, what does all this social media stuff mean for you?

If you are a casual social media user then it means you can connect with people you have not seen or heard from in many years. It also means that you could use your connections to start an online business, whether you have ever thought about that or not. You don’t have to be full-time but you could earn extra money on the internet using social media in various ways.

If you are a business owner it means you have the opportunity to use the power of SMM to your advantage. You can reach your customers and potential market like never before. You can also tap into a whole new client base worldwide that you never could have done without social media. Even small local businesses can expand into a global market nowadays without needing an entire marketing team or a huge budget.

Of course, it will still take time and work. You can’t expect to just sign up for a few social networking sites and have your business explode overnight. You need to build up a following, be consistent with your efforts, have patience, and set yourself apart from everyone else in your niche trying to do the same thing. The key is to be unique, informative, entertaining, and valuable.

It’s a whole new digital world out there. Make sure you aren’t getting left behind!

Here are 5 ways to monetize your blog:

1) Pay Per Click (PPC)

PPC is one of the most popular ways to make money with a blog and Google Adsense is the most popular PPC network that bloggers use. As the name “pay per click” suggests, you get paid each time someone clicks on ads displayed on your blog. The amount of money you can make with each click depends on a few different factors, the most important one being the importance of the topic and the keyword. For instance, Keywords related to finance like credit, mortgage and home loan are some of the highest paying keywords.

PPC advertising networks like Adsense and Bidvertiser, use a smart technology that displays laser targeted ads based on the content of your page. So, if your blog is about food, you won’t see finance related ads displayed on your blog, it will be ads about food and cooking.

2) Cost Per 1000 Impressions (CPM)

With CPM you get paid per impression, usually a few cents per impression. The good thing about CPM is that no one has to click on your ads for you to get paid, the bad news is that most of the time you get paid only a few cents per thousand impression. So, CPM would work much better on blogs with high amounts of traffic.

However, you can still benefit from CPM even if you don’t get much traffic and views. Usually ad networks allow CPM to be used in conjunction with other kinds of ads like PPC ads. Since PPC pays per click, you could place PPC ads above fold and above or under your individual posts, and place your CPM ads on less prominent parts of your blog, where they won’t replace the PPC ads, but you will still get impressions on them. One of the most well-known CPM ad networks is AdBrite.

3) Cost Per Action (CPA)

CPA is self explanatory. Its a method of advertising where in order for publisher (you, the blog owner) to get paid, the visitors has to click on the ad and take the necessary action that is required by the advertisers. These “action”s could be as simple as submitting an email address, registering for a website or subscribing for a free newsletter, to purchasing a product or opting in for a paid service. The most popular kinds of CPA ads are 125×125 ads that are usually placed in the left or right side (side bar) of the blog.

Of course, the commission you receive for each valid transactions, depends on the individual ad and the kind of action it requires. Usually ads that ask visitors to purchase a product or pay for a service pay much higher than ads that ask for free sign-ups and entering basic information such as name and email address. But either way, CPA ads pay a lot more than PPC or CPM ads. Amazon Associates, ClickBank and Commission Junction are some of the biggest CPA advertising networks.

4) In-text Advertising

This is one of the newest kinds of blog monetization methods. There is no need to set aside space on your blog to place ads. With In-text advertising specific keywords within the text of your content are matched with ads, turning those keywords into underlined or double underlined words. In text advertising works the same way as CPC. You get paid every time someone clicks on the ad.

In-text advertising is not for every blog. It really depends on the audience and the topic of the blog and sometimes even the structure of the blog.The key to using in-text advertising successfully is moderation. Don’t set your option to having 1 ad in each sentence, its a big turn off. A few in text ads in each post is plenty. Kontera is one of the biggest In-Text advertising companies out there.

5) Text Links

Text links (I call them affiliate links) are basically links that point to another site. Text links direct visitors from your blog to someone else’s blog or website. When it comes to getting paid, Text links work differently than other methods, meaning the pay is based on the popularity of your blog. The more popular your blog is, the more money you get. Text-Link-Ads and Link Worth are two of the most famous text link advertising companies.

These are some of the most popular and easy ways you could monetize your blog. However, when it comes to blog monetization, there is no one method that could work for every blog and every blogger. That is why you need to do your own research. Experiment with different types of monetization methods, and try different things with each method.

For example, if you use PPC, move your ad blocks around on your page and keep track of the results. Doing so enables you to find out which kind of ad block (color, size, etc) in which spot on your page gives you the best results, thus allowing you to make more money from your blog.

This is a guest post written by Satrap of http://www.blogstash.com

• Ascertains a brand and raises awareness: Since the majority of the population is visiting social media websites like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, you can also create your brand name by letting people know about your webpage. As these are the names of some authentic social networking websites, having a business profile on such sites will help boost your brand image and also raise the awareness among the people.

• You may spy on your competitors: You can easily spy on your competitors by following them on Twitter or Facebook. You can easily see what the tools that they have up their sleeve are and that they’re using in order to keep an edge over others. You can adopt any methods you like that your competitors are using.

• You can track your customers: Almost everyone nowadays uses websites like Twitter and Facebook and therefore they are great places to track your customers. You may come to know what they like about your company or products and services, and also about the problems that they have with the services offered by you. Utilize their constructive criticism and use them for enhancing the quality of your products so that you can make more profits.

• Boosts customer confidence and loyalty: If you have a business profile in all the popular social media websites, you can speak to your customers more easily and frequently. This will boost the confidence of the customers and you can easily maintain a good relationship with them that is beyond the relation of a typical customer and business owner. This will also enhance your customer retention ability.

• Conduct market research: You can visit various websites and make sure they are on par with the others. You may speak to your competitors so that you can share your opinions on various social media websites. Use your new-found information so that you can boost your productivity and also keep an edge over your competition.

Therefore, if you are a business owner who wants to increase its visibility, you must use the social media websites to promote your business in a natural way. This will also help with your SEO efforts to boost the search engine ranking of your website. There really is not downside to utilizing social media for your business other than the small amount of time it takes, so go for it!

This is a guest post sent by Alex Brown of http://www.all360.net

Glad you asked… Here are a few ideas which hopefully won’t mean waiting for months and months for your Google Adsense earnings to get into double digits:

1: eBay!

There are lots of ways to make money on eBay, but the simplest way to start is to sell some of your own stuff. Seriously, just a few things. First it will help later if you have at least sold a few items, and second you are going to need some seed money.

Next step, once you have a little bit of experience and money to spend, you are going to start looking in the wholesale section on eBay. This is by far the easiest way to find potential lots.

Try to buy mixed lots of “stuff” – look for lots which already have bids so that you know you are getting a good price. The bottom line is that you have to take a punt and learn what works, but if you are careful, you can re-sell any lots that don’t work out and at least get most of your money back, so the risk is pretty low.

2: Fiverr!

This is a simple site where people go on and say what they will do for $5. If you can think of some service, or quirky product that you can sell for $5 each, you might be able to make a little extra money on Fiverr.

To get ideas, simply navigate to fiverr.com and see what other people are offering. The key is to come up with something novel that can be done quickly and cheaply.

You may not be able to make a lot doing this, but there are certainly people who do make a nice little bit of extra money by doing silly, fun things. The first step is to spend a long time studying the site and other people’s offers; you will soon get a feel and hopefully some ideas for your own offering.

3: Textbroker!

If you are a native English speaker and you can write pretty well, you can sign up to be a writer on Textbroker.com. The system is simple enough – people who need articles request them, and as a writer you can pick the titles you want to write.

There are different quality levels, and you generally have to start at the bottom, but if you write well you can soon go up to the top quality level and you can actually make some decent money. The key is to get to level 5 – at this level the amount you get paid is actually pretty reasonable – much better than you stacking shelves anyway!

So, there you have it, three ways to make money online fast! Now all you have to do is get started.

This is a guest post written by Alex at http://www.tomakealiving.com

Choosing the right merchant services provider requires an understanding of your credit card processing requirements and research into the various deals that are available. Here are five steps you should take when making your decision:

1) Learn about merchant accounts and the associated fees. You must establish a merchant account before you can accept credit cards. Basically, a merchant account is a bank account that acts as the depository for credit card transaction revenue. Once your merchant services provider has processed your transactions, it deposits the proceeds into your merchant account. The provider charges fees for its services — ask about them upfront and make sure you understand them.

2) Consider your technical requirements. What types of credit card processing are you planning to do? Traditional point-of-sale (POS) at a credit card terminal? Online processing from your website through an electronic gateway? Mobile or wireless processing when your business takes you on the road? Mail order/telephone order (MOTO)? Are most of your transactions card present or card not present? What business expansion or diversification plans do you have for the near future? It could be you need one or more credit card processing options, and you should make that clear to the merchant services providers that you are considering so they can come up with the best package deal for your needs and budget.

3) Identify merchant services providers who want your business. Not all processors work with all businesses. Some don’t deal with start-up operations or merchants with bad credit histories. Many will not service so-called “high risk” businesses, a category that includes adult-related businesses, online casinos and businesses located outside the United States. Look for a reputable processor who deals with businesses similar to yours.

4) Compare fees and services. Once you’ve compiled a list of potential merchant services providers, compare their fees and services to see who comes closest to meeting you requirements. Ask detailed questions about the types of hardware and software each offers. If you’re in the market to change processors, determine if your current system is compatible with their technology. When it comes to fees, going with the cheapest may not be your best bet. Be sure you know what you’re getting for your money, that it fulfills your needs and fits your budget.

5) Scrutinize security. Solid, reliable security may be the only thing standing between your business and disaster. It’s no secret that credit card fraud and identity theft are major threats to merchants and consumers alike. Make sure your credit card processing takes security seriously and is PCI compliant. Your merchant services provider should be able to answer all your security-related questions and train you and your staff in the proper protocols to keep you and your customers safe from a data breach.

Guest post by Marc McDermott, the Online Marketing Manager at Merchant Express, a full-service merchant services provider that has helped thousands of businesses with their credit card processing needs since 1998.

The domain name is blogtrafficjam.com and anyone interested should send us an email at george@websitepromotionbook.com with the subject “blogtrafficjam”. Let us know what price you are interested in buying it for and let us know any questions you may have about the domain. If we don’t have any serious offers then we will be putting it up for auction in the next week or two.

Choosing the right social media tool

Choose a social media tool that you feel comfortable with. If you’re looking for a strictly utilitarian networking approach, you may want to try a website like LinkedIn, which allows you to make in rows with professionals from similar business backgrounds. You can upload a substantial amount of information about your employment history and knowledge in your field, increasing the likelihood that those who want to connect with you would share you interests. However LinkedIn’s reach is limited when compared to the millions and millions of users who utilize more informal social media tools like Facebook and Twitter. These sites tend to attract a much wider variety of followers (professionals and nonprofessionals alike) than those on LinkedIn, which means that you’ll have to work that much harder to establish your unique identity. Ultimately LinkedIn may give you a smaller but more traditionally professional audience, while sites like Twitter and Facebook have a looser feel but a much wider readership.

Update regularly

Once you’ve selected a social media tool, create an account and start posting! Use the site’s searching features to locate users who share similar interests or values, and connect with them. Don’t be afraid of contacting too many individuals — you’re creating a larger network for you business with every new follower. When posting content, share engaging information about your business with a link to your website included at the end. An easy way to reach people is to offer free tips related to the nature of your business. If you’re a financial consultant, give some basic money saving advice for the online entrepreneur. Build trust among your followers by presenting yourself as an affable and outgoing business person.

Separate business and personal personas

Bear in mind that your personal life and opinions should never be advertised on your business’s social media account. You’re trying to gain business contacts, potential clientele, and interested readers on the merit of your business and its ideals. You aren’t creating a social media account to win a popularity contest for your social life; you’re growing a business! In most cases people are following your business online because they enjoy what you have to say about your particular niche, so don’t throw them a curveball by impulsively posting your take on the political issue of the day.

Allow yourself to experiment with social media tools and (if handled correctly) you’ll watch your business thrive, buoyed by feedback and interest of your online followers.

This is a guest post from Carol Wilson who writes for a business insurance site. She contributes articles about a variety of marketing, business, stock market, and small business topics. She can be contacted at: wilson.carol24 @ gmail.com

Congrats Wendy! Look forward to checking it out.

PS. I know I haven’t been writing much on this blog. At some point I plan on talking about that in more detail, but right now I am still working out the details.

Here’s how to set up a business blog that will serve your company well…

Put It In The Right Place

If your company already has a website, make the blog part of your existing website. It should be a menu choice that’s easy for any visitor to find.

If your company doesn’t have a website, choose a domain name for your blog that’s as close to your company name as possible or includes your industry’s primary keywords.

Start With A Simple Design

Most companies power their blogs with WordPress, a blogging platform that many hosting companies will set up for you. Thousands of pre-designed WordPress themes are available, and one of them will likely work for your blog.

Blogs linked to an existing website should echo the colors and design of the site, but stand-alone blogs usually benefit from starting with a simple design. Make changes as your readership grows and you need for more features.

Pack Your Business Blog With Value

Before you tell anyone about the blog, pack it with useful articles so visitors will find good content even on their first visit. Post perhaps a dozen articles before you promote your blog, then keep posting new content at least once a week. Many experts recommend two or three posts each week.

Be sure to include coupons, exclusive offers and other deals along with meaningful content that supports your business goals.

Promote Your Blog At Every Opportunity

If you pay attention to search engine optimization techniques, Google and other search engines will bring traffic to your site, but that doesn’t mean you can neglect other means of promotion.

To get current customers reading your blog, make sure you point out during every customer contact the special offers and unique content available only to blog readers.

To bring new customers to your blog, include a mention of it in all your print and online advertising. Every time a customer sees or hears your company’s name, make sure your blog address is there along with it.

Now that you know more about how to set up a business blog, there’s no reason to delay any longer.

Blogs are powerful promotional and informational tools. Every moment your company is without one, you’re potentially losing money.

Guest post written by Nisha Sandhu who is an editor at the merchant account forum, and has been working with them for 2 years now. Nisha also loves to write and give online business advice to new and growing businesses.

When using affiliate marketing to get ahead in the business world online, you need to make sure that you are aware of the issues at hand. Like everything else, there are a few problems that could occur when using this type of marketing.

#1 Traffic

One of the most common issues with any of the online money making ideas is not having enough traffic. When you work hard to build up your landing page and marketing strategies, you may be disappointed to see that there is hardly any traffic to the site at all. First focus on getting those few people to your site – through search engines or partnering with other sites, and then build on your success.

Once you see that traffic is coming in on a regular basis, you may think that your job is done and you no longer need to worry about it. That is not true. Getting comfortable with your current amount of traffic is the worse thing you can do. When running your own business and promoting products, the more traffic there is, the better it is.

Keep traffic coming in from all directions. Work hard on all major search engines and networks including social media sites. The more areas you can announce your product in, the better you will be. There is always another site that you can promote on. Finding it is not a problem either. You can always do a search and get different results every time.

#2 Pricing

You will need to rethink your prices. You may have them too high and no one can afford them. The same goes for prices that are too low. You won’t make enough money and people may be skeptical and think you are scamming them. Do your research and compare pricing. Be competitive but make money as well.

You can adjust your pricing on occasion so you can always have a competitive price list. Giving the potential affiliate a choice of pricing can make a difference because it puts them in control.

#3 Keywords

Keywords are very important in promoting a business today. If you don’t use good keywords you will not have enough traffic. Do your research and change the keywords a little to promote a product. This can generate more traffic and it can create more money for you. There are several online tools that you can use to help you come up with the right keywords based on the product that you are promoting or the focus of the product.

#4 Put it in words

Another issue is believing in the product that you are offering. If you don’t believe in your product then no one else will either. You need to offer the passion behind the products and people will begin to take you serious. Use the product, take pictures of you using the product, do a before and after picture, blog about it every day, hire a few people to also test the product for you and write a review.

#5 The focus

Losing the focus on the quality is a BIG problem. It takes continuous effort on your part to keep the quality high on your site. When quality is no longer a priority, traffic will decrease. You will need to work even harder to build up your traffic again. This can take time and you can lose money.

Regardless of how much money and time you have to spend on a product, you can use affiliate marketing to help you promote it. As long as you work hard to make it a success, anything is possible.

This is a guest post by Mary Mack. She is a contributing author at the site gradmoneymatters.com and loves to write about money making ideas.

Fortunately, there are simple solutions to the design problems that could be keeping your website from being as effective a tool as possible to bring you additional sales and optimize your search engine rankings. Take a look at the following “how-not-to” list, and then cast a critical eye on your own website. Even a few simple changes could pay big dividends in increased direct business and a more robust web presence.

Six Strategies to Lose Your Viewer: An Overview of What Not to Do and Why

1) Make sure your homepage takes forever to load:

Why Not Do This? To return to Akamai’s findings, you don’t have much time to keep a viewer. Web surfers are an impatient bunch. If they have to sit for five minutes waiting for a page to load, they’re going to look elsewhere. A friend of mine got married recently. When she was looking for a wedding photographer, she found dozens of photographers who wanted to showcase their best (and most high resolution) work on their homepages. The problem for the photographers was that the bride-to-be never got to see those pictures. She got impatient and went on to the next site. She didn’t use their services, she never linked to their sites on her wedding website, and she never raved about their fabulous photos to her friends. I’m sure their homepages looked fantastic once they loaded, but did they achieve their purpose?

2) Make your homepage visually boring

Why Not Do This? This may seem to contradict point number one at first, but a visually unappealing homepage can lose viewers in seconds. Use graphics or photos that catch the eye and draw a viewer in. We can take a lesson from print media here. Newspapers try to place a particularly striking photo “above the fold” on the front page to make their paper look more interesting than the one next to it on the newsstand. You can benefit from this technique as well. Just make sure that your graphics don’t compromise load time.

3) Design your site thinking only of SEO and not an audience of real people

Why Not Do This? In the quest for SEO and those all-important backlinks, businesses often forget a very basic truth. People aren’t coming to your site to help you increase your web presence or your search engine ranking. They want something – to get information, to buy a product, to be entertained. If you don’t provide interesting and original content, they won’t be satisfied. A site with quality content that is updated regularly will keep visitors on your site longer, bring them back again, and prompt them to email a link to friends. This will help you build backlinks naturally. Remember that sites go viral because they’re entertaining or emotionally engaging – not because of their keyword density.

4) Make the purpose of your site unclear:

Why Not Do This? Again, I’m impatient, and I know there are lots of other sites out there that will give me what I want. If I’m looking for grass-fed, certified organic goat cheese, I need to know pretty quickly whether I can find it on your site. If I need to spend more than thirty seconds trying to figure that out, you’ve lost me.

5) Make navigation confusing and difficult:

Why Not Do This? Ok. I can tell from your homepage that you have the cheese I want, but I don’t want to spend all day figuring out how to find a list of your products, prices, and shipping information. Make it clear where the links are that I’ll need to get around your site by placing them in one or two main areas. Don’t bury them all in a lot of text that I may or may not read. If I spend ten minutes on your site, but I never end up buying your product, you’ve won the first battle but lost the war.

6) Jam the homepage with lots and lots of text:

Why Not Do This? Your homepage should draw a viewer in and provide clear links to get to additional information. Use enough text to make the purpose of your site clear and capture the viewer’s attention, but don’t use so much that your viewers get information overload. Think of your own web browsing habits. If you wanted to spend hours reading a lot of words, you’d pick up a copy of War and Peace; you wouldn’t hit the Internet.

The common thread here is that you should always remind yourself that real people are viewing your site. Put yourself in their position. Is my site interesting and fun? Is it easy to get around on? Does it quickly give viewers what they’re looking for? If not, is there really any reason anyone should spend their time there?

Guest post written by Tim Eyre. He helps residential and business customers who use self storage when they don’t have enough storage space on their own property. Tim’s company has locations from coast to coast, including Las Vegas self storage.

I am not sure why affiliate marketers forget this crucial business building step, but list building should be your highest priority if you sell anything online. I don’t care if you are promoting a “how to build an igloo” ebook. Build that list of subscribers, or your business will not last very long.

For example, Google banned thousands of affiliates a while back from their Adwords program and those who weren’t capturing names and email addresses got left out in the cold. Their income dropped almost instantly and there was nothing they could do about it.

The fact is that it should be your highest priority to build a list of raving fans that read your emails. Sure you can make money online by simply driving traffic straight to an offer, but as soon as your traffic source stops producing clicks or your ads get disapproved, you are finished.

Let me give you some of the biggest key benefits of owning a highly responsive list of subscribers.

1. Traffic on Tap – Anytime you want to test out an offer or make some quick cash, you can simply load up your auto-responder with a promo email and click “send”. When that email hits people’s inboxes they click on your link and go to the offer. If you did a great job at preselling, they are going to buy whatever it is you recommended. What’s really important is that you no longer depend on other traffic sources for income. You basically own a traffic source that you can always count on without paying a dime for clicks it generates.

2. Joint Ventures – This is a huge benefit that most affiliate marketers forget about. If you have a highly responsive list, you can leverage it to sell your own products and services. When you promote someone else’s product and do a decent volume of sales for them, 98% of the time they will offer a reciprocal mailing for you. There is a reason why marketers with big lists make most of the money in the internet marketing niche.

3. Knowing What Your Market Wants – Use your list to find out what they want and sell it to them. You can use a service like SurveyMonkey.com and create a simple survey to send out to your subscribers. Ask them what they want or what they need help with. Then create a product or service based on the data you collected. Why guess what they want, when you can simply ask them and remove the risk of poor conversions completely from the picture?

4. Leverage – Don’t ever underestimate people on your list. Some of them might have successful businesses and could become your super affiliates. Imagine announcing your affiliate program to thousands of people with a single click of a button. You could literally overnight get your site flooded with traffic by leveraging your subscribers’ efforts. 1000 affiliates driving 100 clicks per day is better than one joint venture partner, who can send a limited number of clicks.

5. Be Viewed As An Expert – When you have a big audience, your opinion and message, which you send out matters. You could have a big impact on your niche market if you have the power to reach thousands of people with a click of a button. A lot of marketers do not know how to position themselves as experts. Build a list and eventually you won’t have to worry about that because of the instant social proof you can generate.

I think the above 5 key benefits make things very clear and why it’s absolutely crucial to put 100% of your effort into growing your subscriber base. I hope you now realize how powerful this actually is, and how it can take your business to a new level very quickly.

Your ultimate goal is to capture the attention of your market and have it at your disposal any time you want them to take your desired action.

This is a guest post written by Pawel Reszka, the founder of Affhelper.com, a blog dedicated to making money online and internet marketing. Check out his blog is for some cool super affiliate tips.

That process consists of these five steps:

1. Build your own site. It is possible to get started in affiliate marketing and make money online without your own site, but to bring in the big checks and truly be successful you need to have your own site. And not just one site. You should have a separate site for each affiliate offer that you want to promote. If an offer is not worth the few dollars that it costs to get a domain name and the few minutes it takes to add the site to your hosting account then that offer is not worth promoting. You must build it before they can come.

2. Start your own newsletter. You want to brand yourself as the expert within your niche. There is no better way to do that than to publish your own newsletter on a regular basis. Promote it at least as heavily as you do any of your offers. Give something away to get people to sign up to your mailing list to get your newsletter. Go easy on the affiliate offers with your newsletter, keep it mostly content and provide good information. You will be getting affiliate offers in front of your subscribers with the autoresponder series you will set up in the next step.

3. Get an autoresponder. You should already have one for your newsletter, if not then get one now. You want to be able to use it for your newsletter and for a series of preloaded messages that your new subscribers will be getting over time. You can write the messages, stick them in your autoresponder, and set it to send them out to every new subscriber that you get over a specific period of time. You can have your autoresponder loaded up and ready to send out your affiliate offers for months or even years. Just make sure that any affiliate offers are evergreen so that you don’t have to go back and change them.

4. Start article marketing. You want to get your name and your articles out there in front of as many people as you possibly can. If you don’t like to write then you can outsource the articles. Articles that you have submitted to article directories will make you look like an expert in your niche, bring in traffic, and provide you with much needed back links.

5. Expand your linking campaigns. Back links are one of the most important aspects of getting your sites to rank highly in the search engine results. Set up a reciprocal link program on your site where you exchange links with other webmasters. One way links are even better. Get busy and start posting in forums, commenting on blogs, and writing more articles.

Follow these five steps and your affiliate marketing business will be off to a good start. A good foundation is the key to your affiliate marketing success. Get ready to start cashing in those commission checks.

This is a guest post written by Thomas Alling from http://makemoneyhelper.com

Here are some on-page SEO strategies that you should implement on your website…

Domain – With enough work you could technically get any domain ranked highly for any keyword, but you can make it much easier on yourself by choosing the right domain from the start. Getting an exact match domain (EMD) can often be incredibly helpful in ranking your site at the top of search engines. Often times EMD’s will make it to the top 10, or even #1, based on that alone.

The problem is that in most niches all the best exact match domains will already be taken, so it’s not always possible to get one. However, you should at least get one with your main keywords in it. Just add an extra letter or word at the end, or whatever fits well. Having your keywords in the domain can be very helpful for search engine rankings.

Meta Tags – Your title tag and description tag are extremely important SEO factors. Your title tag should contain your main keywords without many extra filler words, but also don’t stuff it so full that it looks ridiculous. Keep the title to around 65 characters and that includes spaces. That’s about what Google shows in the search results so you want to keep it around there.

The description tag should also contain some of your main keywords but all tell a little more about what visitors can expect from your site. This should be kept to around 150 characters (including spaces) so it has to be a quick summary. Again don’t stuff it full of keywords or it could do more harm than good. Just put them in there as naturally as possible so it still reads well and looks good.

Great Content – Your site is worthless without content and in order for it to be a site that gets natural backlinks, high rankings, and so much more, the content must be very high quality. You will often hear internet marketer’s use the line, “Content is king” and there’s a reason for that saying. This is even more true now because there was a recent update at Google that has made really good original content even more important than ever.

Also, inside your content needs to be your keywords. You should include them wherever they fit in a natural way with around 3% density or so. That means for every 100 words on your page about three of them are keywords that you are trying to rank for. Don’t try to stuff them anywhere and everywhere just for the sake of getting them in there. That tactic used to work but it stopped working years ago. Doing that can actually hurt more than it helps.

Site Map – Having a sitemap is a great way to link all the pages of your site together easily and efficiently. Doing that is important for the search engines so they can find all of your content and rank it accordingly. And it also helps human visitors navigate your site much more easily if needed.

That’s pretty much it. Of course, there are many other things than can be included or tweaked for a maximum SEO score. But if you do the things listed above correctly on your site, you will already be far ahead of most sites. Then, you can start concentrating much more on the off-page strategies.

As you know, Jill and I run a successful business helping local businesses with their online web presence. Well, Mainstreet Marketing Fusion is launching today and it has a lot of great tools to help you start a business like ours. In fact, we are happy customers of the previous version of Mainstreet Marketing Machines. You can see our review of the previous version by clicking here. So, I am going to offer a bonus for those of you who buy Mainstreet Marketing Fusion through our affiliate link.

If you buy Mainstreet Marketing Machines through our affiliate link then after we get paid our commission for you using our affiliate link we will give you a free bonus one hour consulting call to answer any questions you have about running your online business.

Here’s what you have to do to get your bonus:

1. Click here on our affiliate link to buy Mainstreet Marketing Fusion http://mainstreetmarketingmachines.com/getitnow/cmd.php?af=32477
2. Then send an email to info @ mantywebdesigns .com with a copy of your receipt.

Once we have verified that you purchased through our link we will contact you to set up a one hour phone consultation with us to answer any of your questions after you have used the program for at least 30 days. Also, we will follow that call up with an email to check on your progress.

Anyway, Mike is offering a free video course on marketing for local small businesses and if that is something that interests you then you should go ahead and check it out.

All you have to do is enter your email for instant and immediate access.

Sign up now for instant access by clicking here
http://mainstreetmarketingmachines.com/cmd.php?af=32477

If you have any questions about the previous version of the program please leave your questions below. Also, feel free to let me know what you think of the training after you go through it.

Plus I recognized both the names of the owners, Kelly Felix (of “The Rich Jerk” fame) and Mike Long. Both are very well known in the internet marketing world. And Kelly actually contacted me shortly afterward, almost as if he somehow knew I had just been told about his site, but there’s no way he could have actually known. It must have been fate. So I decided I probably should give it a look and see what it’s all about.

I told Kelly Felix that I would write a review of bring the fresh if he wanted to set me up with an account. I made it very clear to him that I would give my honest opinion of it and tell the truth about what I thought. I do not write positive reviews just because I was given a free copy of something or because the owner is a well known internet marketer, or for any other reason unless they truly deserve it. If it sucks I am going to flat out say it does. He still set me up with a full disclosure membership after hearing that so he must have been confident in his work. I’ll give him a plus for that.

Of course, I still didn’t have high expectations being the skeptic that I am. And having been an internet marketer for many years seeing all the new crap coming out all the time has made me even more cautious and pessimistic. But I tried to go in with as much of an open mind as I could.

The first thing I noticed is that their sales page isn’t full of hype and outrageous promises like you see far too often on most “how to make money online” type of products. It basically just gives you an overview of what’s inside and what’s not inside along with some videos, testimonials, and a bit of other information. They get another plus right off the bat for that.

But the sales page isn’t really what matters; it’s just a small part of the equation. It’s what’s inside that you pay for and ultimately the only thing that counts. So I dug in expecting to get through it all in an hour or two and be done. Ha! The joke was on me. This thing is packed.

BTF isn’t some ebook or report like you see so often with products in the make money online niche. Instead, this is a full blown membership site complete with videos, guides, interviews, recommended products, forums, bonuses, and so much more. I didn’t count up every minute but my rough estimate is that there has to be somewhere around 40 hours of video plus everything else.

Some of the lessons taught and resources include; market selection, product creation, website success, link building and SEO for high rankings, marketing, conversions, templates, etc… Heck they even give you their personal cell phone numbers so you can call them if you have questions. That is virtually unheard of. It really is loaded!

I’ve been an internet marketer making a great living from my online business since 2003, so at the time of writing this I have 8 years experience. Even still BTF taught me several things I didn’t know, gave me a few more twists on some things I did know, and refreshed me on some things I already knew. I definitely didn’t think it would have much of anything new that I didn’t already know, but I was wrong. It truly is real and useful information for making money online.

Here’s a quick list of the positives:

• It works – I know that the stuff they are teaching actually does work. That’s really all that matters and the #1 reason why I recommend it.

• Several hours of video – Everything is shown to you so it is much easier to understand and implement.

• Solid advice and training – Not a bunch of fluff and filler. It’s packed full of truly useful stuff.

• Easy to follow – You aren’t left more confused than when you started as tends to happen with other internet marketing products.

• Great value at a low price – They massively over-deliver.

• Up to date – They continually update as needed.

• Active forum – Lots of discussion going on in there about all sorts of different internet marketing and money making topics.

• Amazing support – You can contact them via email, Skype, forum, phone numbers, Facebook, and Twitter. What more could you ask for?

And a couple negative things I found:

• Design – I know this doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things but it’s not a pretty site by any means. I think it certainly could have been designed much better. That doesn’t take away any of the excellent content but it does make the membership seem less professional.

• It could use more ebooks to follow – The videos are great and you can watch them over and over again as needed, but sometimes I like to have ebooks to read and reference if needed. That would have been the icing on the cake.

One thing I want to make very clear about Bring the Fresh is that it is NOT a scam or rip-off or fraud in any sense of those words! It’s also not one of those stupid “get rich quick” schemes. I’ve seen a few bring the fresh scam reviews and I have no idea how or why they would say that because it definitely isn’t. I have many years of internet marketing experience so I have seen a lot of scams, ripoffs, schemes, misleading information, and everything else under the sun. This is one site that certainly doesn’t deserve the negative reviews, in my opinion. It is the real deal.

It’s rare for me to fully recommend a product but in this case I do. I see no reason why BTF should be avoided or not recommended. It is legitimate and if you follow the things they teach and take action on them, you will make money online. There’s not much else to say so that is the end of my honest bring the fresh review.

Hopefully this has helped you make an informed decision about BTF. Here is my link for it again if you want to check it out: Bring the Fresh