You need great content for your company’s site and blog. Your web site is a cornerstone of your web marketing program. If you want people to stick around, you must give them good information. And it should be something they need. Something they want. Why are they coming to your site? Are they leaving frustrated? Stop them in their tracks.

Over at Conversation Marketing, Ian has listed 5 sources of content that you may not even realize you already have. Right there. Waiting for you to grab it. And hopefully some of it is exactly what your visitors are looking …read more

Testimonials can be a very powerful marketing tool. Customers want to trust a company before doing business. Testimonials of positive experiences can help build that trust. Here’s a step by step process on how to use testimonials in marketing:
1. Get the testimonials
Getting the testimonials can be difficult. But after successful transactions, it’s appropriate to ask for a testimonial. The easiest way to ask for and receive a testimonials is via email. Whatever you do, don’t make up fake testimonials.
2. Collect a group of testimonials
One or two testimonials aren’t very helpful. You should have at least a handful of testimonials …read more

Customer testimonials are important to your business. You want your customers to talk about you in a positive way. With social media use on the rise, it is ever easier for your customers to let their friends know about their experiences. So the question is whether word of mouth marketing is helping or hurting you?
Recently I was witness to a perfect example of how word of mouth affects a business. A web hosting company, noticing a huge spike in traffic, temporarily shut down a web site — thinking the site was under a DOS or spam attack. That seems like …read more

Is your company’s PR effort dead or dying? Sometimes we all need a kick in the head to get new ideas flowing.  Is this one of those times for your small business?  If you are running out of ideas, try some of these:
1 Adopt a charity (local or online) that has some connection to your business or that will get your business recognized in the community.  Offer to help sponsor an event for the charity or run a membership campaign. Be the spokesperson for the organization, or get on their board of directors. In other words, get yourself identified with …read more

(www.thegoldenpencil.com)
When a potential client comes to your website (if you don’t have a website see You’re a Writer – You Need a Website!) nothing is more reassuring than a few testimonials, provided they are genuine. Ideally they will be accompanied by a picture of the person endorsing your writing. I’ll admit I haven’t gotten pictures, but my websites do have a few testimonials and I know they help would-be customers make up their mind to contact me.
The way I get the testimonial is two-fold:

First, I simply ask. I usually do this toward the end of the a project, often …read more