Here are 5 key methods to market your business online

1. Get a professional brand – getting a professional logo design is a great start, but it is also critical to plan your branding, which is based on the customer experience and how your Calgary company is interpreted by the customer from near and afar. Get a logo and supporting stationary like business cards, signage, booklets and postcards at least and during this process work through basic marketing factors such as demographics, culture, sales region and budgeting for Calgary ad campaigns .

2. Get a properly developed Web site design - Once you have the branding planned and established you can move this onto the Web by getting a custom site that supports your branding and business model. Ideally, you will secure  a domain, a calgary website and domain-based email addresses. The web site must reflect the corporate identity, provide critical information about your company and also provide service to generate targeted hits . If e-commerce is not a suitable fit for your company’s services, you can use a custom form to direct and define sales, or use an online chat system to connect with your customer directly.

3. Market your Web presence Online – this includes having an active custom web design , email list and any active submissions to groups, help sites or forums. You can also increase traffic and sales by actively managing your SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and SEM (Search Engine Marketing) campaigns each week. Examples of this are commenting on blogs, getting back links to your site and running paid advertisements in search engines and directories. The more focused and niche-based your campaigns are online, the better results you will have. But, keep in mind that you need to research what people are looking for and balance those results with what you’d like them to see.

4. Market your Web presence Offline – this is the only way you can attract people to your online business when they are not at their computer. Look at any magazine from the early 1990’s (if you can find one) and I wager it will be nearly impossible to find ads with web addresses in them. These days classified ads, paper ads, posters, uniforms, video, tv, vehicle signage, stationary and pretty much any media channel is used by Calgary businesses to promote their Web presence. If your website is e-commerce enabled, then your offline marketing efforts can drive draw targeted traffic to your company just by handing out a business card. The customer may never call your number, but they may well purchase something from you with nothing more than a good first impression.

5. Be Consistent and be Professional – in all cases, whether online or offline, be consistent with your branding and communications . Being professional does not mean being overly conservative, but it does require conscious attention to details. For example, simple typos in an introductory letter or a broken link on your web site can detract from the total impression of your company. Make sure you follow your initial branding plan and mission statement and triple-check any published items that cannot be easily updated .

For more information about Calgary Web Design and Calgary Graphic Design Services, please visit www.blinddrop.com.

Here are 5 Great Reasons why YOU should Set up a Blog

1. Low cost – Probably one of my favorite things about blogs – after setting up an expensive website that took two months and several thousand to build or doing it myself and having it look like crap,  blogs are one of the cheapest and most effective marketing tools – in terms of money.  For just a few dollars a month you can register your domain name and host your own blog.  Set up costs are low, as are maintenance costs.  And most people do not need to hire a developer –ever – to set up and maintain a blog.  Even if you do need some tech help, there are many reasonable alternatives out there for blog development
2. Connect – A blog’s format is tailor-made to create a connection and conversation with an audience.  The format of daily posts can read more like journal entries rather than marketing pieces and most readers allow some leeway when it comes to grammar and phrasing.  Now this doesn’t mean you have to get all confessional in a blog – I seldom do, but I certainly appreciate the informal tone and the ability to experiment.  But don’t forget that a lot of blogs – especially ones where one of the purposes is to sell something, should be informative – but you can be down home information.
3. A Two Way Conversation – Add in the ability for readers to comment in real time on your posts – and you to answer them back, and you have a true “conversation” going with your audience
4. Public Relations and Media Exposure – Journalists will call you -yes it’s true – if you have a decent informative blog and can be seen as an expert in something you might a call from a journalist asking to be part of a story.  Now more likely you will have to scout out for story ideas (try HARO.com) and pitch yourself to a journalist – but trust me – pointing to your blog and all of your readers commenting like crazy will really raise your cred factor.   a
5. Search Engine Optimization – most blog platforms are inherently search engine optimized –this means that they take care of turning your content into a format that search engines like and can find – it’s so much easier with a blog than with almost any other website platform.  This means that if people are searching for the topics you write about – you will be found.  And the great thing about search engine traffic is that it is free – yup – these are free visitors that might be interested in what you’re selling, promoting or writing about.  Make sure you download the All in One SEO plugin for Wordpress and add that to really pump up your SEO.