That being said, there is no question that many small businesses have been buffeted by the economic storm that the country has endured over the past few years. In continuing efforts to keep their doors open, business owners have cut costs by cutting online advertising. But I would suggest that small business owners rethink those cuts.

The potential solution

Mr./Ms. Merchant: If you are concerned about cost, establish an online presence for your business using local listings. Yahoo! Local and Google Places are two simple means to get online. The basic listings are free, and it’s an easy way for online searchers to find you. As noted in many other columns under the Small Is Beautiful heading, make sure your listing content is correct and is the same for each of the online sources you’re posting to. The only spend incurred is the time you take to set up the listings.

The result is the assurance that your business will be found when local shoppers are looking online for your products and/or services. The process isn’t difficult; follow the step by step directions as presented for Google Places, Yahoo! Local, or Yellowpages.com, for example.

For a modest monthly fee, you can upgrade to the enhanced listings which allow more info and content to be included in your listing. The choice is yours. With little fuss and less cost you have established an online listing that will give visibility to your business. And once your info is posted, you don’t have to do anything else aside from editing should any of the contact/location content change.

The alternatives?

Many small business owners may be more familiar with long-standing advertising media such as yellow page and newspaper ads and, perhaps, Val-Pak coupons. However, those products provide little if any means for measuring their efficacy. How many customers arrive at your business based on a yellow page listing? Or a newspaper ad? Val-Pak provides coupons or other paper forms that may be brought to the business to secure a discount.

Absent those pieces of paper, though, how can one measure the value of media that is so difficult to track? The alternatives may be well known, but with the advent of online marketing those methods of publicizing a business do not provide the same value as an enhanced business listing such as those described above.

Where do the above tactics get small businesses? A merchant wants people to buy what he/she has to offer. In order to gain customers, the public must know what is offered. How do customers discover what a business has to offer? Advertising.

What is the easiest, most affordable form of advertising and one that we now know more and more people are turning to? Internet advertising. Billions of searches are conducted online for businesses just like yours. Don’t you  think you should be there?

I’ve been offering my views via the “Small Is Beautiful” column in Search Engine Land for seven months now, and while there have been numerous retweets and a few comments about my musings, I don’t have a clear notion as to whom my customers are. Since it seems that I’ve not done my research, I’m asking for your help.

Who are you? Who who?

Stealthily appropriating lyrics from a well-known rock band presents the focus for this column: Who Are My Readers?

I assume that the readers of this column, whether it’s my monthly entry or others’ contributions, are primarily individuals who work in the online search marketing industry. My guess is that few actual small business owners are finding this and reading; however, I would love to be wrong. Some more sophisticated business owners may spend time researching information to improve and enhance their online marketing efforts by reading Search Engine Land and other online sources, but I suspect most owners of SMBs are too busy doing their jobs and sustaining their businesses to do a lot of reading about marketing.

Others of you may work with those same owners of small businesses, helping them to market their products and services via online marketing and advertising efforts. You probably work for a small marketing firm or you yourself run a one-person shop and can benefit from the info found here not only when advising your clients but also in marketing your company.

The point here is that I can speculate all day about who my readers are, but I have little notion as to whether those speculations are at all accurate. Your feedback can help me determine the topics to research and write on.

Where have we been?

Reviewing my columns from these last months, shows that I’ve offered tips on preparing your website launch successfully on search engines; the importance of research in SMB marketing success; the value of close geo-targeting; customer satisfaction; the value of online advertising using different formats; and mobile visibility.

My question is: what do you want to read about going forward?

Obviously, there will be events, products, movements on the part of the search engines that will contribute to the topic list. But it would benefit me enormously to know what the readers of this column would like to read about. So tell me. Call it my own customer satisfaction survey. Feel free to comment on the column below or click on “send the author an email” link that follows each column. I want to know what you think!

Going forward

For all I know, my editor at Search Engine Land will not be happy with my composition, as it does not “offer creative advice and tips that smaller, nimble search marketers can exploit to gain a competitive advantage online.” But the objective of this piece is to prompt suggestions for future columns that will do that very thing. I definitely see value here!

Do you want to know more about whether you should use social media? Are you familiar with crowd-sourcing? Do you want to be? Would it help your marketing efforts? Have you looked at the changes Google has been implementing in the past few weeks? Does it have any bearing on your marketing efforts? These are some of the things that can be the focus of future columns. What do you think?

Getting found on the go

For companies that offer goods buyers may want while on the go, having a mobile presence provides a great advantage for generating business. To quote Kirsten Mangers, CEO of WebVisible: “Consumers search for local products and services in different ways, using various formats and multiple devices.” And these searches may be conducted myriad ways on those devices. “They might look for a drycleaner from their phone, scan listings of local restaurants from their car, and research plumbers from their home computer. If your online marketing doesn’t make you visible in every one of those searches, you’re losing potential customers.”

According to Experian Simmons’ 2010 American Mobile Consumer Report, 31% of mobile phone users said they had accessed the Internet from a mobile phone during the previous 30 days. That said, a small business owner who creates a website so his business can be found online should be thinking beyond the desktop/laptop to the next step: considering how the business can be found using a mobile device.

Place pages, maps, local listings

Among the ways a small business can be found on a mobile device is through the map tools. Make sure your business is found using local business listings online. Business listings can be “claimed” – validated, if you will – on Google, for example, and the information included can range from basic address and phone number to more extended info when a business claims its “Place Page.” Location, services, hours of operation, photographs, and other information may be provided through this Google service.  For businesses that appeal to customers on the go, map tools are essential elements for being seen and getting found via mobile.

When searching for one of those drycleaners mentioned above, a business listing can bring in customers who need help quickly. Internet directories such as Yellowpages.com and others provide listings for businesses, organized by category or type. For those searchers who are accustomed to using yellow page directories the mobile equivalent provides a ready and familiar means to access business info. Any opportunity available for enhanced listing information should be taken. Check out last week’s Small Is Beautiful column by Hanan Lifshitz for details on how to manage this aspect of your online presence.

Mobile websites

The newest wrinkle in mobile info is access to a business website via mobile device. Obviously, the viewing screen available on a handset is going to alter the way a website is seen. Accordingly, many businesses are investigating the creation of a mobile website or landing page that will render effectively on a smaller screen. While a user can always access the Internet and view a business website, the user experience isn’t always a good one since the amount of material on a webpage won’t appear in one screen on a handheld device. Scrolling back and forth, up and down may be required to find the desired content. A mobile website or landing page can be designed to ensure that the user will see the most essential content in a readable format. While this transformation of a computer website to mobile website might seem daunting, there are tools available that can be found online that can revise the site to accommodate the small, handheld screen.

If small businesses are going to continue to gain customers in the 21^st century they need to be where the customers are looking. Handheld devices are gaining in popularity and prominence in the search sphere. Small business owners need to make sure they can be found on the mobile platforms. Creating a website that is “mobile friendly” is a critical step in making that happen. Don’t be left behind!

Research: what is it good for?

On its face, research sounds a bit intimidating. And it can be. Taken to ultimate levels, research can be all-consuming. Data can bury you! However, even a minimal amount of research can provide insights to small businesses that illuminate its customer base and provide direction regarding the best actions to secure those customers. When developing a business plan, all business owners have to consider who their customers are and how to find them. Just where are they? And how do customers find a business that provides what they are looking for? Research can answer many of those questions. Cool, huh?

It’s already been determined that people looking for a product or service use online sources to find those things. According to BIA/Kelsey, 97% of consumers use online media to find local products and services. So it’s clear that being online is a great advantage to local businesses. And just how ought a small, local business be online? A website? A local business listing? Display and search ad campaign? Mobile ads? Some of these? All of these? How do you know which is most useful? Research helps.

What do your customers want?

There are many methods which may be employed to determine what your customers want and how they find you. While a business owner may have a good idea of customers’ needs and how to reach them, there is nothing like data to support anecdotal evidence. Data talks! But how can you get to that info? Surveys, polls, interviews, focus groups, and questionnaires can be used to gather data.

Businesses that have some web presence can provide links to surveys to gain insights to what a user is looking for; they can ask customers who come to their brick and mortar store how they found the store (bet it was online!); they can send out questionnaires via snail mail; they can use a focus group. Businesses with websites can use an online analytics tool to gain info as well.

How much can you know?

While a larger data pool provides deeper insight, even small samplings may offer useful information about customer behavior. Most small business owners don’t have limitless time to devote to this research, but even small efforts can prove valuable. If you offer emergency services for cars might a mobile ad or listing be critical to your success? Do you own a small bistro that only serves afterhours diners? Should your ads serve from late afternoon to late night? When do customers find you?

Who are you talking to?

Research can be conducted for how you message – keyword lists, website content, geo-targeting, ad format – and who you message – sex/gender, ethnicity, age, income, location.  The more you know about your prospective customers, the better your marketing effort will be. That can translate into more paying customers, not just prospective customers.

Once you determine who your customers are, think about how to message to them. Perhaps the single male age 18-24 responds differently than single male age 52 and up. How can a message/ad be crafted to each of these segments? The product may be desired by both groups, but success in gaining these different customers may rest in how the message is presented.

What do you gain?

Research, research, research: Don’t assume you know how people search for your services. Do your research; conduct polls, surveys, interview customers, use focus groups. Learn all you can about your prospective customers. The more data you gather the more you learn about those customers. Determine how to message to different segments. The more of this work done, the better your returns will be. And research won’t be nearly as scary as you may have thought!

PPC advertising is part science, part art, and part prayer. A foundation for serving ads to the most desirable demographic comes through the use of geo-targeting; that is, making sure the ad gets seen where the business is found. To some extent, geo-targeting is a given. You have to put the ad in front of the eyes of the target consumer. The scope of geo-targeting may vary based on how niche your business is or how densely populated your locale is. It serves no purpose to market a local shoe store one thousand miles from its location. But how broadly or narrowly you geo-target is only the first step in making the most of your ad placement.

The critical objective of all targeting is ensuring that an ad is seen by that most desirable demographic. Branding is a bonus, but buyers are better. With that being said, the other question regarding geo-targeting is this: even though options exist to target very narrowly, is there value in doing so? Just because we can target narrowly, does it mean that we should? Is targeting to a zip code, for example, really the most cost-effective means of getting paying customers?

Targeting to zip codes: is anybody there?

Currently, ads may be served locally using state, DMA (Designated Marketing Area), city, radius, or zip code targeting, depending on search provider used. As the online ad industry matures, the effectiveness and value of targeting has become more and more important. Serving ads to viewers outside of the service area is useless. But we must have some knowledge of how searches are conducted. Are searchers using zip codes to find a nearby car wash? Are they using neighborhood or housing development names to locate a business geographically? Can a business rely on very close targeting of this type (zip, neighborhood) and ensure enough impressions to get the customers it needs to succeed?

Before a business can confidently target ads using narrow targeting, it must be confident the search will be conducted using zips or neighborhood names, for example. So the ability to target effectively is critical for greater value. Tied to the geo-target is the need for inventory for that placement. Are users searching for your product or service in that targeted area? If so, how many search queries are run for that item that you want to sell? Added to all of those worthwhile questions is how confident are you that the search engine employed can truly target to such a finite area? Have you run any test campaigns to see results produced using narrow geo-targeting?

For local small business owners, confidence that their ad is viewed by the most likely customers is essential for return on investment (ROI). While traffic volume may be diminished by closer targeting, the likelihood of conversion to spending customers is much greater if the location of those customers is the focus of ad, along with the demographic elements that the desirable customer contains. If I sell luxury automobiles, it is in my interest to put my ads in front of buyers with income required to afford a vehicle. High income searchers, located in exclusive communities that match an age demographic likely to purchase a Lexus or Mercedes, are going to provide the best sale opportunity for me.

However, fashioning a search campaign to a limited geography must be decided based on a cost-benefit analysis. While I may sell one of my luxury autos to someone in the targeted area, the cost of that campaign may be greater than the return if I’m jockeying for position in a highly competitive vertical in a high cost market. Whenever considering where – or how broadly or narrowly – to target a campaign, the cost of the campaign and how its results may differ depending on the targeting employed must be studied. What are the consequences of choosing a very specific geo-target that is so restricted that the ad is only seen by a select group, none of whom are in the market for what I’m selling? Might it be wiser to broaden the targeting to increase the number of viewers and raise the chances of gaining potential buyers? And might the greater geographic scope of the campaign mean lower cost for traffic and greater chance of viewers who are shopping for just what I’m selling?

It stands to reason that an assessment of when to choose a large rather than small geo-market depends on what is for sale and how many units have to be moved in order to generate appreciable profits. But one should not assume that if potential buyers exist in a given area that that is the only likely targeting option that will produce desired results. For this type of narrow targeting, tools like Google Maps business listings or Yahoo! Local Maps can be the foundation for your online advertising.

More elements to consider

While geographic targeting is a fundamental piece of search placement, as the industry matures other sorts of targeting that will be equally important will emerge. Increasingly, demographic information will be used to fine tune targeting. Age range, income level, relationship status, sex/gender, race/ethnicity, family size, and political persuasion may all play a greater role in focusing online advertising, just as it already does in more traditional advertising. We’re already seeing this sort of demographic use in ads found on Facebook. I can’t tell you how many items are now being directed at me as a woman . . . of a certain age!

The future for medium and large businesses is much the same. Branding opportunities may be more important for large regional or national businesses, ensuring retention of existing customers and expanding the customer base with new buyers. Ultimately, finding the viewers who are the most eligible spenders – those who are looking for a particular product – is the most essential determinant of how ads are placed. Budgets may be larger, resources for managing paid placement campaigns may be greater, but the ultimate goal is the same. With that in mind, moving beyond the big online search engines – Google, Yahoo, Bing – and on to social networking sites and mobile services with online ad placement is as important for big businesses as it is for small ones.

As social networks draw more users of varied demographics (see increase in “older” users joining Facebook), social networks will grow in value for placement. By using geographic targeting in conjunction with demographic narrowing of ad placement, the chances of finding those very customers you’ve been waiting for become much greater.

Recognizing that each campaign requires careful examination of the components likely to contribute to making sales is essential. Narrow or broad geo-targeting must be employed based on the unique aspects of the product promoted, the budget available for the campaign, and the return required by the merchant to make his/her business a success. The more sophisticated the analysis is, the greater our chances of finding just the right mix for online success.

Observing those steps will produce happy customers. That being said, it is worth noting that just one disgruntled customer can wreak havoc on a company’s reputation if that customer chooses to blast their criticism across blogs, industry forums, and message boards. They may employ the new Google Sidewiki feature and place caustic comments adjacent to your site (although some sites may turn off this feature if they’re aware they can do so.) Thus, brand advocates – along with loyalty and/or reward programs, can help keep the brand shiny and positive in the public eye.

As established in last month’s column, customer reviews are important to the perception consumers have of your business. While unhappy customers seem all too willing to post condemnatory comments based on their experience with you, happy customers are not nearly as inclined to do the same. In order to get those supportive customers to advocate for you, a loyalty or rewards program can be just the step to encourage such action.

What’s in it for me?

Most of us are compelled by offers for “free stuff.” If the free stuff has real value that relates to what we already pay for, those items attract interest. That interest can be used to create a body of customers who will promote a business they are happy with. Customer reward or loyalty programs offer perks which not only reward customers but also work to retain those customers. A rewards program can serve as a way for customers to share their positive experiences with your products and services in a variety of online communities. In return for their positive contributions, customers are rewarded with perks, such as product upgrades, discounts, or points for benefits in the future. The critical element required for finding those satisfied customers is a truly happy customer experience.

A business can buy customers for a time, but once the truth of bad customer support or a faulty product is evident, no reward in the world will keep a customer loyal. So, the key to the advocacy program is to satisfy your customer. In so doing, you build a base for advocates of your brand, and ensure their positive commentary. These satisfied customers don’t just provide a pool of potential brand advocates; as customers who will continue to spend money and sustain the business’s financial health, they are also the bedrock of success for a business.

Reward, VIP, loyalty programs: what’s in a name?

There are many types of programs that enhance a consumer’s loyalty to a business or a brand. Some are set up with a points system whereby purchases receive a point-per-dollar value. Examples of this type of program include MyCokeRewards, which allows point accrual for purchasing products from businesses that may not be Coke’s. This provides incentive to purchase Coke products while earning points that may be used on other companies’ products. If customers are deliberating over which soft drink to purchase, rewards from Coke brands might be just the incentive that pushes them to buy from Coca-Cola! And the quality of the product keeps customers coming back.

Other programs, such as Borders Rewards, offer discount coupons to program members, along with a coupon for a dollar value after a specific level of spend has been achieved. Probably the most familiar rewards programs are those associated with airlines. Upgrades in seating, access to airport lounges, and discounts for airfares by using miles (points) for airfare or miles in conjunction with money all are benefits that accrue to loyal customers.

What’s the plan?

If you are not prepared to undertake the creation of an in-house loyalty program, it is possible to find existing program providers. A quick online search can provide an extensive list of customer loyalty program providers. Numerous guides on how to build and make the most of your program are available if you are just beginning to develop your rewards program. It’s possible to find information on the style, form, and size that fits your need.

Don’t be afraid to entertain the prospect of a customer rewards or loyalty program for your business. It could prove to be a great benefit for your business, in terms of retaining customers and promoting your business to future customers.

This column addresses the customer feedback process. Part 2 (in a future issue) will discuss loyalty programs and their benefits to your business.

Unhappy customers: they’re everywhere!

The immediacy of the online environment requires you to monitor blogs and other forums for criticisms of your business or services you sell. Damaging postings can be blasted across the blogosphere with blinding speed. Before you know it, your company can be trashed in dozens of locations. Repairing the damage is very difficult. Restoring your company’s reputation is time-consuming, and the financial setback from negative reviews may be long-lasting. As Pete Blackshaw pointed out in 2008, awareness of customer satisfaction is essential to long-term profitability. Instead of waiting to fix the wrongs, take pre-emptive measures to assure your customers are happy and anything written about your business is positive.

Tell us how we’re doing

I think of customer relations as a two-track system consisting of the following:

• Managing customer feedback
• Rewarding loyal customers

If you do a great job with customer support and satisfaction, the feedback process ought to be fairly painless. You should be able to count on positive feedback from your customers, which is always nice! The logistics of setting up and monitoring a feedback mechanism would be the only pain point, depending on your resources.

Feedback can be as simple as sending out emails asking for customer responses, ranging from a survey of questions with multiple choice answers to an open-ended “tell us how we’re doing” sort of email. If you want, you can even provide a perk to the respondents, similar to Borders.com, which offers a discount coupon if the online survey is completed within a set time frame. Offers such as these encourage customers to submit their assessment of a business and its services or products.

If you’re not sure where to start with a survey, look online. There are numerous online providers of surveys, many of which gather your results in a user-friendly format. There are online providers of guidelines for surveys which recognize the importance of how your questions and reply choices are phrased. After replies arrive, what do you do with the information?

Now what?

All the feedback in the world is of no use if you do not take the comments under advisement, examine criticism, and determine solutions for any frequently noted complaints. The point of customer surveys is to determine weaknesses your company may have and make repairs that ensure your customers are happy with the products, services, and treatment they receive. If you find repeated topics of complaint, you have a problem that you must tend to.

While negative responses are never pleasant to read, remember that “knowledge is power!”  Use this knowledge to fix the sore spots. Nip the problem before it becomes insurmountable. By doing so, you may forestall these types of complaints in the future. And that will help retain customers you did not know you might lose. Remember, keeping existing customers is easier than gaining new customers!

A simpler approach

If you are not prepared to create and conduct surveys for your company, you still can tap into customer sentiment by seeking out posts on industry blogs, the Better Business Bureau (BBB) site, Yelp, or Finding Dulcinea, which has a section providing a clearing house for rating sites, including online rating and reviews of stores, online stores, and product reviews. It also has links to Bizrate and MySimon, Reseller Ratings, and online stores like eBay.

Chances are that among all the options, you may find reviews or ratings of your store or business. Unfortunately, people are more inclined to post when they’re unhappy, rather than when they’re satisfied with a product or service. So it’s up to you to cultivate happy customers and encourage them to offer positive feedback for your business.

How to make happy customers

Among the ways to do this is by establishing a loyalty or rewards program. There are many methods available for a rewards program, and I intend to discuss some of those in a future column. In the meantime, the way you handle customer comments, complaints, and criticism can do much to enhance your reputation; it’s important to note that reputation management is gaining a lot of buzz! By ensuring that your customers know they’re being heard, you gain credibility and support from them. Doing so bolsters your reputation as a caring company – one that cares about satisfying customer needs.

Taken collectively, listening, attending to customer requests and responding to their concerns all contribute to improving the positive image that all businesses want. For those customers who are especially loyal and effusive in their support, a rewards or loyalty program can provide a forum for publicizing their positive experiences with your business.

Let’s take a look at how some of those options can assist local businesses in promoting themselves.

Give ‘em a picture!

Back in the day, display or banner ads were the basic format for online advertising. Standard 468×60 banners were found on publisher sites and were the launching pad for businesses seeking online visibility. As time passed, other display units – buttons, pop-ups, rectangles, and skyscrapers – appeared and were standardized by the IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau). Banner ads were the most common online ad format until peaking around 2000-01, when the dotcom crash led to a re-evaluation of the most effective online ad format. The result was paid placement in the form of Yahoo, Google, MSN, and all the other providers who were gobbled up by the big players in the space.

Due to the emergence of search, display or banner ads lost caché and before long did not get the attention once afforded. However, recent recognition of display ads in conjunction with search ads has lent display a new credibility. There are many display networks (ValueClick, Burst, Adify, etc.) that can fulfill the need for online advertising, and Google has made a new commitment to combining search and display via AdWords.

How did they get my number?

While it has been suggested that using call tracking numbers (CTN) can be problematic for local search, I would contend that when used wisely, call tracking numbers can provide a very useful means for measuring the effectiveness of ads. If used with a call recording feature or a whisper element prior to answering, businesses can gain insights on how well their ad campaigns are performing. Callbright, Ifbyphone, eStara, and Marchex VoiceStar among others provide various services depending on merchant needs.

If, for example, one call number is used for a campaign in conjunction with a splash page, the merchant will know that any call reported from that CTN is a result of the ad campaign with which the number is associated. Regarding concerns over using multiple call tracking numbers (see SEL article “Be Wary Of Call Tracking Numbers In Local Search” linked above), a merchant could be advised to use the same CTN in each medium: one for search, one for print, one for display.  That way the number can help evaluate success of each ad medium.

On special this week

A great way to focus user attention on products you want to emphasize or promote is by using a splash or landing page in your campaign. Sometimes called a jump page, this one-page site allows users to see just the information for a product on which the advertiser wants to focus sales. If Best Buy is offering a discount on plasma televisions for the month of October, a jump page can be the destination showing the info on the special offer with ad copy created for the campaign that mirrors the special offer on the page. This provides a specific connection between the ad copy and the jump page that draws users to the product discounted. The direct correlation between ad and page can reveal efficacy of campaign features. Going forward, as other products are spotlighted the same process may be employed.

Almost like being on TV!

Online video is one of the newer ad formats available to advertisers. Advertisers have used video on television for decades, and now video format can be viewed online. If a small business already has a local commercial running on television, the video from that television commercial can be linked to the online campaign for a dynamic means to convey the ad message. If an advertiser website has no video,  Windows Moviemaker and Jivox are just two sources available for creating video for online ad campaigns.  If your ad campaigns are outsourced, have your provider create a video for you!

Online marketing provides a myriad of ad types and formats, all of which can boost exposure for a business. For the small business that is not ready to jump into the effort using all of these suggested methods, adding one at a time and measuring the impact of the new ad type can provide important insight regarding how to allocate ad budget. Some of these may be more useful than others; it depends on the type of business. The point here is that small businesses should not limit their exposure by using just one sort of online ad format. Multiple points of interaction increases exposure to potential customers, which is what all advertising is about!

Location, location, location

Sometimes website owners/business people must assume that if a visitor is looking at their website, that visitor must be in the same geographic location as the business. As we all know, this isn’t a given. Making sure your location is indicated on your website makes all the difference in how successfully you generate business. If you sell goods online, your location is not relevant. Anyone living anywhere can access your site and purchase your product(s). But if you are a brick and mortar establishment, counting on bringing customers in the door, you must provide your location. Potential customers want to know where you are in relation to where they are.

Define a service area

If you provide a service, such as a plumbing, your location may not be critical but your service area is. For any business that works with customers offline, where you are or the area you serve is vital to generate web traffic that can lead to paying customers. In my experience, if I cannot determine where the business is after a couple of clicks through a website, I will give up and move on to another provider. Don’t deprive yourself of available paying customers. Put that location on the site in an obvious, prominent place.

Locally targeted advertising

Related to that, if you serve a local area make sure that is where your ad appears. There is little value in broadcasting your ad placement across a geographic area you cannot service. Whether you are a brick and mortar or a service area-based business, target your ad to the geographic area you either expect your customers to come from or to the area you are willing to serve. Beyond that scope any click traffic to your site is largely wasted.

K.I.S.S.

A third consideration: do not overload your website with too much content or too many fancy features. This may sound counter-intuitive, but think about it: if you bury your primary service or product amidst so much information that a viewer cannot find that salient info, you could lose potential customers. Too much can be as bad as not enough information. This doesn’t mean that if you are a plumber you cannot include information on different types of services you provide. It does mean that it would be wise to place information on different pages of your site. Provide a menu that is easy to find and follow, labeling each menu tab with a unique product or service. In this fashion, it’s easy to provide rich content but still allow the site user to find what they are looking for easily and quickly.

By the same token, don’t overload your site with music, scrolling text, rolling images, or excessive flash images. While each of these features might be nice enhancements, overdoing them can cause delays in page loading, which can cost you customers. Additionally, search engines (Google most specifically) weigh the time it takes for your website to load. Excessive load time can erode your quality score, hurt your ad ranking, and thus weaken your visibility and the consequent traffic you want to gain. Fewer potential customers may find you, resulting in lost business. A good rule of thumb is to make your site clean, clear, and easy to navigate. Make sure needed information can be found in one or two clicks. Your customers will thank you!

Not all non-profits are created equal

Finally, a last suggestion to those working in the not-for-profit sector:  if your site includes a link to allow for donations, make sure you have the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) non-profit status clearly stated on the page where your click lands. Even if a viewer must click to a different page to make an online donation, the IRS info (501 c 3, as an example) must be found on the page where the initial click-through arrives. If the entity does not have this information on the page, a strong likelihood exists that search engines will reject the campaign. Do not run the risk of delaying your campaign launch by not having this content visible.

Unfortunately, there are people who try soliciting funds online for all kinds of reasons. I’ve seen people asking for donations because they wanted to buy a house, because they wanted to go to college, and because they got in trouble with the law. While those may all be worthy reasons and warrant charitable assistance, they are not recognized by search engines as viable solicitations. So for all of the bonafide non-profits out there, make sure this content is included. It will ensure your campaign will begin serving without delay.

If the suggestions here are considered during the construction of a website, the ease of launching a successful site will be evident.

Owners of small businesses usually need to devote all their time to their customers. They would be best served by letting experts in Internet advertising create and manage their online ad campaigns. This allows the local plumber to plumb and those in online advertising to advertise, drawing on their expertise to produce the most effective and cost-efficient ad campaigns for a local business.

Why do Joe Plumber and Andy Accountant think they are perfectly capable of running online ad campaigns? I believe that the accessibility of online ad tools like Google’s AdWords contributes to the idea that creating and managing online ads is easy. After all, anyone can go online and create an account, set up ad copy and keywords, determine targeting, and decide how much money to spend on a campaign. If everyone has access to these tools, how hard can it be to use them?

A Madison Avenue ad agency draws on previous campaign results and years of experience to determine what works best for a print or television ad campaign. It is doubtful that our local business owner would stroll in to a big agency and tell the ad exec how to do his or her job. People who work in online advertising do much the same thing, spending hours each day examining ad copy and keywords, targeting options, quality scores, page rankings, bid pricing, content development and a myriad of other elements that go into a successful online ad campaign. Familiarity with these elements allows those with this knowledge to craft campaigns, tweaking them as performance data is gathered in order to produce the best return on investment (ROI) for their client. There is a great deal of information to be sifted in order to create the cost effective—best performing—campaign. Simply having access to an online advertising service—Google AdWords or Microsoft AdCenter—should not lead business owners to believe they can do this work just as well as a paid professional. Just because you can do it doesn’t mean you should!

Here’s an example for you. Andy Accountant is one of my clients. He had been managing his own Google AdWords campaign for a year or so but after much effort on my part agreed to give us his online advertising business. While Andy’s efforts were not bad, I was sure that if allowed to manage the campaign I could achieve better results and save Andy the time and effort of managing his campaign online.

Among the first things I did was to remove the one-term keywords like accountant and accounting since I was confident that longer terms like income tax returns, tax accountant, income tax filing, business accountant, certified public accountant and other terms that were more specific would produce more effective results. Additionally, I set these for exact match rather than broad match, thus improving the likelihood of traffic producing real leads instead of just clicks to the website. While Andy was generating ample click traffic to his site the conversion to leads was minimal. After my revisions Andy realized fewer clicks but actually had more connections generated after potential customers clicked to his website and then followed that with a phone call or submitted an interest form.

Additionally, we were able to assign a call tracking number to Andy’s campaign, thus channeling calls through a trackable number that clearly matched calls to the campaign we were delivering. Over a period of six months, the campaign CTR improved from 0.07% (accounting) with Andy’s terms to 2.04% (income tax filing) to 4.82% (income tax returns) and an overall connection rate of over 30% (connections being all forms of contact with client). Thus, just because you can manage your online ad campaign yourself, doesn’t mean you should!

The ability to associate online ads with traffic to a website and to track clicks from a particular ad appearing on a specific search engine means that there is unprecedented accountability for performance in online advertising. In no other format does such a clear connection between an ad and a customer/sale exist. As such, online SEM experts are constantly required to demonstrate the efficacy of their work. They monitor performance and make adjustments in real time that no print ad exec has the option to do. The data gathered requires a time commitment to a level of scrutiny that no small business owner can afford. Thus, said business owner is best served by using an SEM professional and not setting up his or her own ad campaign.

Ultimately, there is no difference between the expertise of print advertising professionals and online advertising professionals, apart, of course, from their understanding of the unique elements of print and online ad campaigns. It’s just a matter of perception. Andy Accountant and Joe Plumber should not presume to know Samantha SEM-Expert’s business anymore than he should presume to know how to manage a print ad campaign better than an ad agency. Just because Andy and Joe have access to online advertising systems doesn’t mean they should use them.

Rely on experts! That is what they’re there for!