Have you ever tried to explain your job to someone. One of the hardest parts is remembering all those little items that have, over time, become second nature. The things you do or know without really thinking about them.
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SEO & Online Marketing
Marketing your small business online is not just Marketing 101. You also need an understanding of how search engines find sites (SEO) and how your customers use websites.
Web Marketing Strategies
April Workshop
Michael Regan – TIMR Web Services
Please Note:
The date has been changed to April 23rd
Event: Web Wisdom: A panel discussion on Marketing, SEO & Social Media
- Presentors:Carolyn Touey, Pieter Vorster
and Michael Regan - Time: 9:30am to 12:00am
- Date: April 23, 2010
- Price: $75.00
- Place:The Broken Spoke 420 Fitzgerald Avenue
Courtenay BC
Space is limited so please pre-register. Contact Carolyn Touhey at (250) 335-2342 or email Michael Regan [email protected] to register or for more information.
Carolyn Touhey of SmartBiz and Pieter Vorster from Continual Palingenesis—Social Media Solutions will be joining me for this workshop.
The focus will continue to be on marketing, with an even stronger focus on adding Social Marketing to your marketing strategy.
Carolyn will be explaining how to integrate your web marketing into your overall marketing stragey. She will cover the basics that MUST be in place before you even start to think of a website.
In addition to covering the basics of SEO and website marketing, I will be discussing how to measure the results of your SEO. We will look at getting actionable measurements, ones that will let you improve your ROI, rather than a lot of data, from your analytics tools. As before the focus will be on Google Analytics, however, the ideas can be applied to any analytic tool.
In addition, I will be showing some of the new features of Google Analytics and some of the new tools Google has been developing to help the small business owner.
Pieter will be covering the role of Social Media in your marketing. Facebook. Twitter and other social network sites all have their own written and unwritten rules. Getting noticed takes more than starting your own account or even buying a few ads. Social Media takes a lot of time – is the ROI worth the time you will invest.
How to Get There
Targeting Mobile Devices
I belong to a local business support group. At our last meeting the topic of iPhone apps came up. iPhone apps are getting to be like blogs – everyone thinks they need one, they just don’t know why. I mentioned that a webpage for mobile devices would be more appropriate.
After the meeting I was asked how they work – so here are the basics.
Posted: February 25th, 2010
Author: Michael Regan
Posted in business, marketing, technical | No Comments »
Next Workshop on Website ROI
Michael Regan – TIMR Web Services
Event: Web Marketing Workshop
Presentors:Carolyn Touey and Michael Regan
Time: 10:00am to 12:00am
Date: Feb. 26th, 2010
Place:6409 Old Island Highway, Union Bay
Please contact Carolyn Touey at (250) 335-2342 to register.
Last December I held a workshop with Carolyn Touey of SmartBiz on “What Every Business Owner Should Know To Maximize Investment In A Website”. It was such a success that we will be doing it again on February 26th.
While the title remains the same, some of the content, especially on website ROI, will be different.
Carolyn Touhey – Smart Biz
I will be focusing more on getting actionable measurements, rather than a lot of data, from your analytics tools. As before the focus will be on Google Analytics, however, the ideas can be applied to any analytic tool.
In addition, I will be showing some of the new features of Google Analytics and some of the new tools Google has been developing to help the small business owner.
There will also be more information on Social Media Marketing.
Facebook. Twitter and other social network sites all have their own written and unwritten rules. Getting noticed takes more than starting your own account or even buying a few ads. Social Media takes a lot of time – is the ROI worth the time you will invest.
How to Get There
Posted: February 10th, 2010
Author: Michael Regan
Posted in business, marketing, sales | No Comments »
Hiring an SEO Consultant
If you have a website or you are going to get a website and you think you need some search engine optimization (SEO).
You are probably right!
This video from SEOmoz (where SEO consultants go for help) will shed some light on how to first assess your needs and second give some insight into what to look for in hiring a consultant or outsourcing your SEO work.
Posted: February 8th, 2010
Author: Michael Regan
Posted in business, marketing, SEM, SEO | No Comments »
It Is All Fertilizer
Source Crowsnest Pass Railway Route
The picture is a little before my time (circa 1953).
I started my working career (1966) in Trail BC at Cominco (now Teck Cominco) as a labourer. The work was dirty and dangerous – but not particularly hard and certainly not intellectually challenging. However, looking back, many of things I learnt there are still relevant. One of the most important was in the field of marketing. Which, at that time, was as far from being one of my career goals as a fish trying to fly.
I was working filling bags of fertilizer at Cominco’s Warfield operation.
Posted: January 24th, 2010
Author: Michael Regan
Posted in branding, business, marketing | No Comments »
A Quick Rant
OK – I know the people that should read this won’t but here it is anyway.
We get a LOT of requests for link exchanges. And, even though we don’t currently even have a ‘Link’ page, I do check a lot of them. You never know when something may be of value.
Here are some of the things that will get an email sent to the trash:
- Obvious SPAM. If you haven’t gone to the trouble of using my name – it is SPAM.
- Putting a note on the bottom of you email that it isn’t SPAM makes it SPAM.
- I am a terrible speller – which is why I have spell checker. So, no spelling mistakes.
- Don’t lie. The last email said they represented a PR5 website – it wasn’t. (Why lie – do you really think I wouldn’t check.)
- Don’t tell me how much exchanging links with you will increase my traffic.
Exchanging links can bring traffic to your site. If you are asking for a link exchange, make sure it will add value to each site. For example, one of our client runs a resort. We regularly link them to local events and tourist attractions. These links benefit both sites.
Don’t exchange links just to get more links. It serves no purpose and sites that might bring you traffic will avoid you.
CPC Price vs Volume
I was researching an article on using ‘long tail’ keywords and came across a suprising bit of data. There is not correlation between the search volume and the Cost Per Click (CPC) of Google Adwords.
One of the keyword phrases I was targeting was ‘internet marketing’. Plugging that into the Google Keyword Tool and you get a list of the top 150 related search terms. You also have the option of turning on the data for ‘Average Est. CPC’ as reported by Google Adwords. Turn that on and things get confusing.
The most popular search term, not surprisingly as ‘internet marketing’. The search volume for December was 1,830,000 and the CPC was $6.50 – which should put you in one of the top three positions.
However, that term was not the most expensive. That distinction goes to ‘internet marketing and advertising company’ for $14.10. Infact, according to Google, the five most expensive terms related to ‘internet marketing’ all has less than 10,000 in search volume.
The expensive and highly targeted keyword phrases such as ‘internet marketing and advertising company’ are relying on the query string to filter the potential clients to a few thousand. However, a better strategy may be to build a target ad and get a larger exposure at a lower price.
My only advice is to do your homework before you launch your Adwords campaign. Look for value opportunities. (For searches related to ‘internet marketing’ the best terms cost less than $7.00.) And, of course test and measure.
Posted: January 11th, 2010
Author: Michael Regan
Posted in business, Google, marketing | No Comments »
A Yahoo Hompage – Really?
Is it just me – or is the concept of a ‘Home Page’ becoming passé?
Back in the old days, the last century for those of us using Linux, browsers only had one window. And, when you started your browser it opened up your ‘Home Page’. Fast forward to 2010 and even Internet Explorer has tabs and can restore a session.
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